Winner of Living Etc Best Bespoke Joinery Award 23
We are thrilled to share that for the second consecutive year we have been awarded a prestigious Living Etc Award: Best Bespoke Joinery.
We extend our heartfelt thanks to our incredible, often brave, clients who entrust us to collaborate with them to create meaningful, highly unique spaces that we are all so proud of.
Receiving validation of our craftsmanship and design excellence from esteemed industry colleagues is an enormous honour. Thank you Living Etc judges!
We're increasingly asked to incorporate some sort of home bar into our joinery designs, so much so that they now usurp wine rooms. Read on to find out more about our thoughts on this trend.
The Brief:
In this large open plan basement, our client was keen to create a versatile multi-use entertainment space.
Growing teenagers needed the room for gaming and playing table tennis, and the adults wished the space to be comfortable for everyday use while still sophisticated enough to host friends and entertain in style.
A Living Etc award later and I think we can, hopefully without sounding too smug, say we’ve delivered on the brief!
The Design:
The entire room has been painted dark blue Fired Earth’s Tempest, creating a cosy subterranean space that oozes an elegant, moody 1920’s prohibition vibe.
Mounted into the ceiling either side of an oversized foxed mirror in a brass frame, a pair of hanging brass display shelves filled with an enviable collection of bottles, creates a strong central focal point to the design. The combination of reflective surfaces and the play of light from an overhead skylight results in a captivating and visually enticing display.
To minimise its visual impact, the wall-hung joinery has been painted in the same deep blue shade of Tempest so that it blends discreetly into the panelled walls.
A structural niche has been cleverly incorporated into the design, hiding the sink area out of immediate view.
Foxed mirror is used again on the backsplash to make the narrow space feel larger, and a bronze prep sink helps to keep the space looking elegant and elevated.
Fluted glass doors on the wall-mounted cupboard ensures that glassware needn’t be stacked with military precision, there is much fun to be had elsewhere in this space after all!
Baton detailing on the solid ash lime washed lower cabinetry helps hide the functionality of the unit making it feel less like a kitchen or bar and more like the elegant joinery that one would expect in a living space.
Behind the detailed door fronts all the obligatory white goods needed for a fully functional bar can be found, including wine fridge, freezer and dishwasher.
It’s come as a pleasant suprise to us how much we’ve come to use the bar in our home.
We assumed it would come into its own when we entertain, but actually find that increasingly we use it as a place within the home to escape to.
Unlike the counter stools in the kitchen where there is always a little job to be done, sitting at the bar after work gives my partner and I an opportunity to take a moment away from screens and decompress together.
And when it comes to entertaining guests, a bar like this sets the tone! Thankfully, the marble countertops are pretty robust as we discovered when our friends decided to climb on top of them and reenact the scene out of Coyote Ugly! We’re certainly creating memories down here!
Chris, Homeowner
Much to the amusement of visiting guests, it hasn’t escaped their notice that both the study and the bar share the same baton design detail. We can, however, verify that this is where the similarity ends! The gin remains freely available in the bar and the study is a fully functional home office with in-drawer charging docks, extendable shelves for printers and an inbuilt filling cabinet.
Across the corridor we installed a climate controlled wine storage room, with spy window onto the living space. This glazed opening helps to keep the wine room feeling spacious and inviting by allowing light to move through this subterranean space.
We hope that you have enjoyed reading about our Sudbrook project. For more images check out our project page.
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