Extending a 1930s Bungalow

Martin Swatton has extended and totally transformed an ordinary 1930s bungalow into a light, bright and contemporary living space with some quirky touches.

Let’s face it, traditional bungalows have never really been considered chic. Inhabited by people of a certain age, their biggest draw is usually the lack of stairs rather than any intrinsic architectural merit. For 52- year-old Martin Swatton, though, finding a run-down bungalow to live in became something of a mission.

“I didn’t want a place which had already been done up,” he explains. “For me, it was a case of finding somewhere affordable and dated that I could extend and completely redesign in a contemporary way. I’d been living in a small traditional cottage, but was inspired to try something a bit more radical and modern by a television programme I’d seen, and this bungalow was relatively untouched and came with a garden which was large enough to take a rear extension.”

Photographs show the condition of the drab 1930s property when Martin first viewed it in 2005. The interiors were a warren of compact, unexciting living spaces, and the original single-storey building had already been poorly extended up into the roof to provide a second bedroom and a poky box room, served by a rooflight and an ugly off-centre dormer window.

“Whenever I travel abroad, I enjoy driving around looking at buildings, and I knew that I wanted the roof of my new glass box to project out like a canopy,” says Martin of his fabulous open plan living/dining extension. “It shades the glass and creates a covered outdoor deck space that can be used like another room for much of the year, as well as making the whole ground floor appear much larger than it actually is — particularly when the glass doors are pushed back out of the way.”

Not only has Martin extended out into the garden – which involved removing virtually the entire back wall of the building and replacing it with the twometre- square glazed sliding doors – but the internal layout has been totally rearranged, the staircase repositioned and even the height of the internal doors increased to give the impression of higher ceilings. Adding vertical radiators and removing skirting boards has also enhanced the illusion of height.

“Originally the lounge was at the front of the house, and this room has been divided up to make an office and a new hallway for the spiral staircase,” Martin explains. “The old dining room is a bedroom and, although the kitchen remained in the same place, it’s now open plan to the extended lounge/dining area at the back. By the time I’d finished the work, I did wonder whether it would have been easier to simply knock the whole thing down and build from scratch, but I don’t think I would have been given planning permission in such a traditional close of 1930s bungalows.”

Martin worked closely with his architect to produce the plans, which were duly submitted to the local planning department. “I made the fatal error of not speaking to my neighbours about what I had in mind,” he admits. “It was on my ‘to-do’ list, but there were so many other things to think about that I simply ran out of time before I was due to go abroad for six weeks.”

Upon his return, Martin was met with letters objecting to his planning application — and the knowledge that time was fast running out. He wrote to everyone in the close and soon allayed his neighbours’ concerns by explaining that additional off-street parking would be provided and that all of the major changes would be tucked out of sight in the back garden.

Ultimately, the front elevation of the bungalow has remained virtually unchanged — apart from the new cedar garage door and an imposing 1.4-metre-wide entrance door. This pivots inwards to reveal the remodelled layout of the house, and once inside absolutely nothing remains to remind you that you are actually standing in a 1930s bungalow.

Where the staircase once stood there are now views right through the spacious entrance hallway to the eightmetre- wide glazed extension, which opens out through sliding glass doors onto a Japanese-style garden beyond.

“There are things I’ve done, such as lining up skylights with windows, which no one would really notice but which would otherwise jar,” says Martin. “One particular theme which runs throughout the house and garden is the use of horizontal lines to form a slat effect, so that everything from the specially made mild steel spiral staircase to the fences, the three skylights in the extension and even the handles on the kitchen cupboards were chosen with this in mind.”

Such attention to detail meant that Martin often found it difficult to source exactly what he wanted for the house, and his solution has been to customise various standard items and to come up with original designs, which have then been produced by his builder or specialists. The result is a truly unique home, where everything has been painstakingly considered.

Inspiration has come from some unlikely sources: the polished plaster wall finish in the ground floor shower room was something Martin had seen in a restaurant cloakroom, while the idea for the ceiling pod in the kitchen – which houses lights, speakers and an extractor fan – came from a local fish and chip shop.

“When it came to choosing the low wooden garden furniture for the deck area, I couldn’t find anything I liked, so this has been designed and made especially for me in a durable Brazilian hardwood called ipê,” says Martin, who went on to develop his own range of contemporary hand-crafted outdoor furniture, which he now sells under the name Amapa.

“The yellow and grey MDF and stud bedhead in the master bedroom was another project which my builder, David Lloyd, made up to my design,”Martin continues. “He proved to be the perfect person to choose for the job, as he’s very resourceful and has great imagination and a flair for creating unusual things.”

Colour plays an important part in the otherwise industrial-looking interior, and Martin has introduced some vivid shades into the house. The kitchen features Italian orange stools and a graphite-coloured wall and floor that act as the perfect foil to the white cabinets. These carcasses were purchased from B&Q before spray-painting MDF door and drawer fronts acid green — creating a one-off finish on a budget.

“I was always mindful of costs, especially as I started to rely on my credit cards towards the end of the project,” says Martin. “Sometimes it pays to splash out, though, and I’m very glad that I took the decision to include the water rill in the garden instead of planting it up with lavender to save money. It was only when I saw the empty ditch filled with rainwater, which was reflecting and glinting off the roof canopy, that I knew I had to stick with my first idea to line it and fill it with black pebbles and water, despite the £5,000 cost.”

Previously, Martin had run a graphic design company, but his interest in architecture and interior design has now led him to offer his services to other homeowners keen to remodel in a contemporary fashion.

“I’ve certainly had some very positive feedback about my house,” he says, “and although it’s not everyone’s taste, the great light and feeling of space tend to appeal across the board — and there’s something really satisfying about taking a drab and uninteresting property and giving it a whole new lease of life.”