Homebuilding & Renovating Awards 2010

This being a plot within an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) in the middle of open countryside in the Cotswolds, John and Leigh’s vision of building a contemporary family home was always likely to meet resistance. “It was actually the conservation officer who encouraged us to come up with something quite contemporary,” John recalls.

Near the end of the line, a friendly local councillor suggested they take it to committee stage anyway. Amongst other measures the couple lobbied for local support and received 72 letters of support and gave a powerful speech at the meeting — and we won,” says Leigh. “It was a huge relief.”

“We set out to build one of Britain’s very best eco houses and as a result of what we’ve done, the home’s total calculated heat loss is just 6.6kW — about that of a small one bedroom flat.”

Why it won?

The judges had significant reservations about the size of this home, generally holding the view that it was fundamentally unsustainable for a family with children to need a home so off-the-scale in floor area. Yet, the fact remains that this home has multiple and flexible usage both as a home working environment and, it seems, as a test house that John could try out the many, occasionally competing, eco theories in practice. It is so well built in eco terms that its heat demand is the same as that of a property less than 20 times smaller.

The fact is, despite its size, this is a home that is effectively a positive-energy house and goes a long way to prove that eco homes can come in all shapes and sizes — for this is truly a grand home in terms of scale and ambition and the fact that it manages to combine such luxury with such low impact is a huge achievement.

The January Issue of H&R will have the full story on John & Leigh's amazing new home.