Contemporary House, Seale

Case study

A contemporary replacement dwelling in the Surrey Green Belt.

Set within mature pine woodland near Farnham, this house replaced an existing dwelling on a constrained Green Belt site. The brief was twofold: a striking, contemporary family home, and a planning strategy capable of delivering it at the scale the site could support.

Green Belt policy strictly limits how much larger a replacement dwelling can be than the house it succeeds. We built the planning case on an extensive fallback position, the development that could lawfully be carried out on the site in any event, to justify a substantial uplift in floor space. The application was refused by the local authority and pursued to appeal, where consent was secured.

The architecture

The house is unmistakably contemporary: crisp white render, warm timber cladding and natural stone, with full-height glazing opening the principal rooms to the woodland and gardens. A cantilevered upper volume and a double-height glazed entrance give the composition its drama, while landscaped terraces step the house down into its setting.

On screen

The house was recently used as a filming location for the 2025 feature film A Working Man (Amazon MGM Studios). You can see it on screen in the official trailer.

Why it worked

Refusal was not the end of the road. A carefully evidenced fallback position, argued at appeal, secured a home substantially larger than Green Belt policy would ordinarily allow, and a house that has since become a recognisable contemporary landmark. Integrating the architecture and the planning case from the outset is what made that outcome possible.