‘This House Was A Wreck When We Bought It'

Holly Dormon and Matthew Haswell stripped this house back to a shell and started from scratch…

Holly and Matthew weren’t put off by the rundown state of this Forties house. ‘My dad is a builder and has always encouraged me to see the potential in things and take risks,’ says Holly. ‘It had a large garden and off-street parking, so we took Dad to the second viewing to make sure that everything we wanted to do could be done within our budget! We lived with Matt’s mum for a year, because it took ages to get planning permission and, when the work started, there was no way we could live there with our two girls. At one point, the house was just a shell with few internal walls.’

The biggest project was extending and reconfiguring the ground floor to create a large, open-plan room consisting of a kitchen, dining space and sitting area. ‘I love the pitched roof of the extension,’ says Holly. ‘It adds a real sense of scale and drama. And, although the Crittall-style doors were a big expense, they let in so much light and give the room lots of character. The different zones in this space each have their own feel and it works so much better for us, because we can prepare food, eat together and, when we have friends over, I can cook but still socialise.’