Architect & interior designer in Holmes Chapel

The houses of Holmes Chapel

At the centre sit timber-framed survivals and the brick tower of St Luke’s; radiating from it, decades of estate housing and, on the fringes towards Cranage and Sproston, larger detached houses and converted farm buildings. The commonest brief here is not a period restoration but a good house that has never been planned around the family living in it.

Where the value usually sits in Holmes Chapel

Volume-built houses respond dramatically to plan surgery: a relocated door, a stolen metre of hall, a wall taken out where the structure allows. Before adding footprint to a 1990s detached house, it is worth finding out how much better the existing footprint could be — the answer is frequently a whole room’s worth.

Architecture and interiors, decided together

The wall you move decides the joinery that fits against it; the window you add decides the colour that works beneath it. Because I design both, decisions in Holmes Chapel houses get made once — plan, light, kitchen, storage, materials and lighting resolved as a single scheme rather than handed between an architect and a decorator six months apart.