Brick House, London W2
2005
Caruso St John Architects

Brick House London - Stirling Prize nominee 2006

Brick House by Caruso St John Architects [Review by Hugh Miller]:

As the only residential scheme on the shortlist, the Brick House’s singularity demonstrates the difficulty of producing good homes. The product of an almost strangulating brief, the house could not elevate more than 1 storey from ground level and is heavily overlook on 3 sides. The effect of this on the internal spaces is marked. Shards of light penetrate the concrete ceiling slab through shafts, orientated to maintain privacy, making the living areas emit a cave-like quality. Light is subjected to taut control as it plays over the brick interior casting shadow as well as luminosity over its angular forms.

Enough rhetoric, does it work as a house? The roughness of the material pallet along with the sharp-edged detailing appears too dominant to provide the ‘home’ with a sense of sanctuary or comfort. It seems to lack the ability to withstand cloths being thrown on the floor, dodgy posters on the wall, the things that make our houses into homes. This house, although it triumphs over adversity in terms of brief and context, looses its way slightly when subjected to the way people actually live.



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