Graeme, Sarah and their two children, together with their architect Derek Trowell have created a unique living space within this old prison and an attached former Malt House.
Grade two listed as The Former House of Correction and, more recently, used in an industrial context as a garage for a local company, in it’s long history it had never been used as a dwelling. Sarah an Graeme were looking for a new efficient home and studio space. Their existing home, which was a traditional Georgian house, was always cold and cost a fortune to run.
Their new home has heating and domestic hot water provided from a ground source heat pump supplied and installed by our team. The heat pump draws energy from pipework located in two bore holes drilled in the yard to the side of the building. Underfloor heating is installed on the ground floor of the building with cast iron radiators upstairs.
It is clear that the new owners have gone out of their way to retain as much of the original building as possible. Any architectural additions have been carefully selected to maintain a strong industrial aesthetic. This required the sourcing of a number of ‘retro’ materials and fittings.
Sarah indicated from the outset that they were keen to have an energy efficient green home, this would be a challenge as the structure of the building was historic. The demands of preserving as much of the original fabric of the building meant that the energy efficiencies had to be gained with low visual impact. They explored many options including ground source, air source, pellets and gas. Ground source seemed to tick all the boxes, so the boreholes were drilled and the system was installed.
Graeme said ”we can’t believe it, we now have a unique house conversion with a green modern system to heat our home and provide hot water”. Sarah added “it’s been a long and challenging road but we stuck to our original dream, now we live and work in a warm and inviting building called The Workhouse”.