Channel Projects have completed the refurbishment and extension of House by the Sea; a detached 1920s property perched above the undulating coastline of South Devon, looking out across a sweeping bay towards Bolt Head and the southwest coast path that traces the headland below.
Rented out as a holiday home for decades, House by the Sea played host to its current owners every summer for the past 30 years. The family’s long standing connection to the home led to their acquiring it in 2022, when they commissioned Channel Projects to update the layout and ready it for permanent occupancy by reestablishing clear zoning areas as well as revitalising its bygone seaside character.
The house had accumulated the marks of frequent traffic and high turnover – featuring carpeted floors, divided windows, and a series of unsympathetic extensions that had carved its interior into a maze of small rooms linked by up to 30 doors.
Despite its extraordinary position, the original layout had left the house largely disconnected from its landscape; the sea visible but unreachable, glimpsed through glazing bars rather than felt. The house sat elevated above its front garden and slightly dug into the rear, so that the land fell away in almost every direction, a drama the interior had done little to acknowledge.
House by the Sea focuses on strengthening sightlines throughout the site, and enhancing its relationship between house, garden, and sea. The former double-spine circulation, two competing routes through a fragmented plan, has been consolidated into a single, legible enfilade of well-proportioned, interconnected rooms, ensuring constant visual and spatial connection to the seascape.
Openings are aligned to track the sun's movement throughout the day. Blocked apertures were reinstated to open long diagonal views through the interior; the glazing line of a former external veranda was drawn outward to claim the threshold between inside and out. From the front door, a sightline now runs the full width of the house to the garden beyond, revealing an unexpected vista that had previously been obscured.
Channel Projects was careful not to over-expose the site. Rather than broadening the full elevation to the view as other properties have done, the existing window proportions are largely retained. Enough wall remains intact, giving the house a sense of shelter and enclosure against the rapidly changing coastal weather.
Two original features anchor the interior throughout, a conscious decision made by Channel Projects, underscoring the material dialogue between the old and new site respectively. The original hearth in the central living area, that had been diminished and overcrowded by painted panelling and beams, now reads as the centrepiece in the original 1927 brick, uncovering a confident craft-led charm in the newly opened plan room. The stairwell, too, is retained and the lower three steps reoriented, providing further continuity between the living spaces and the refreshed upstairs sleeping quarters, adding definition to its structural core that was previously overlooked.
At one point during construction, standing within the stripped shell, it was possible to see from the sub-floor to the ridge in a single uninterrupted sweep. A poorly built rear wing was demolished and replaced with a more generous new extension, accommodating a peaceful guest suite and offering flexible ground-floor living spaces that can adapt to the owner's needs over time, a quiet provision for later life, designed without announcement.
The same attention extends to every corner of House by the Sea. During works, demolition of a 1990s concrete block wall at the rear revealed an original Devon stone boundary behind it, hidden for decades, quietly reinstated, now forming the backbone of a newly planted rear garden which the clients have cultivated in tandem with the build, and with an ambition to long continue this hobby.
In addition, a former garage, much too small for any modern car and made redundant by the reconfigured rear access, has been converted into an operating gardener's studio – a long workbench, a sink, and a greenhouse alongside, with vegetable beds beyond.
Channel Projects offer an exemplar in thoughtful architecture, working with, and, not against constraints, yielding opportunity to experiment boldly with material on site, and uncover delightful moments within. House by the Sea provides a long-overdue reunion between a house and its landscape, restored to a home that now lives as generously as its foreground.
Team:
Architects: Channel Projects
Client: Confidential
Form of contract/procurement: Traditional - JCT
Structural engineer: NR Associates
Landscape design: Channel Projects
Quantity Surveyor: Gates Consultants
Furniture and Finishings: Nicola Hulbert Interior Design
Main Contractor: WM Construction
Photographer: Fred Haworth
Materials Used:
Windows + Doors: Idealcombi
Timber flooring: Ted Todd
Quarry tiles: Ketley Brick
Kitchen: Treyone
Greenhouse Supplier: Alitex Ltd
Stone Bricks: Hutton Stone
Sanitaryware: CP Hart
Light fittings: Orlight / Astro
Ironmongery: Corston
