A new studio space for a landscape artist sitting within a beautiful walled garden in Norfolk.

The site of a former 19th Century Manor House, lost to fire in the 1960s, provides a series of contrasting landscapes for the new building to engage with: the formality of the original walled garden and the wild pasture beyond which retains traces of the formal Jacobean landscape.

The proposed studio building aligns with a key axis within the historic landscape, with openings looking towards a romantic vista which in the 19th century terminated in an elaborate fountain. The proposals create a considered enfilade of internal and external rooms drawing on a rich tradition of follies within the landscape.

The proposal seeks to create a delicate cabinet like building, in contrast, and subservient to, the robust original brickwork. The studio sits adjacent to the remaining Butler’s house, on the footprint of the old ballroom, as a remnant of the elaborate timber paneling which once filled the Manor. This lightweight timber framed piece of furniture is inserted into the historic traces of the wider landscape, at once both an internal and external object.

The proposed studio building is partially enclosed and concealed by the existing garden walls and together with the remaining structure, it encloses the walled garden which surrounds the rear of the house, and creates visual connections to the wild pasture beyond.