White Horse Barn is a carefully crafted response to its rural setting, balancing the character of a traditional barn with the needs of contemporary family life. Set in the heart of the Cotswolds, the design draws inspiration from the region’s architectural heritage whilst embracing a forward-thinking approach to space, materiality, and sustainability. More than just a house, this project was shaped by an in-depth understanding of how its residents wanted to live—how they move through their day, connect with nature, and gather with family and friends. Every element of the design was tailored to support their lifestyle, from spaces that capture the morning sun to rooms that come alive in the evening light. The home harnesses panoramic hillside views whilst maintaining a sense of enclosure, creating a retreat that balances openness with intimacy. Materiality, spatial flow, and natural light have all been carefully considered to ensure the home is not just a place to live, but a space that enhances daily rituals, strengthens connections, and offers an enduring sense of belonging rooted in the timeless beauty of the Cotswolds.
A CONTEMPORARY INTERPRETATION OF A COTSWOLD BARN
A strong architectural language underpins this Cotswold barn conversion, balancing the integrity of its original structure with a contemporary approach to openness, enclosure, and functionality. The existing agricultural frame remains at its core, but a carefully considered intervention refines it into a modern country home that is both grounded and ethereal. A dynamic façade of operable Shou-Sugi-Ban timber screens allows the building to shift between protection and permeability. When closed, the house presents a striking blackened silhouette, offering privacy and shielding the interiors from the elements. When opened, the architecture dissolves into the hillside, reinforcing an unbroken connection between the home and the landscape.
Inside, the sequence of spaces strikes a careful balance between expansiveness and intimacy. The double-height living, dining, and kitchen areas amplify a sense of scale whilst maintaining warmth and tactility. Rather than rigid partitions, the design allows spaces to slip fluidly from one to the next, cultivating a rhythm between social interaction and retreat. Each space is carefully positioned to engage with natural light, ensuring the home evolves with the changing rhythms of the day.
A SEAMLESS FLOW BETWEEN ARRIVAL AND LIVING
The experience of the home begins at the entrance, where a dramatic screened threshold creates a moment of pause before unveiling uninterrupted views across the Cotswold hills. Recognising that in rural living most arrivals are by vehicle, the well-appointed garage—designed to accommodate the client’s car collection—serves as a primary entry point, seamlessly integrating into the home’s flow.
From here, movement through the home follows a carefully considered rhythm. A clustered core of essential spaces—including a secondary kitchen, utility areas, and cloakroom—ensures efficiency, whilst more personal retreats, such as a private nail salon and cinema, are positioned for quiet escape. Beyond these functional and leisure spaces, the design unfolds into the expansive, open-plan living, dining, and kitchen areas, where fluid connections between zones allow for both intimate moments and lively gatherings.
The four bedrooms are positioned along the south façade, each offering a private, south-facing terrace with deep overhangs that provide shade and passive climate control. Large openings allow fresh air to circulate freely, creating a tranquil retreat where the clients can remain connected to nature—sleeping with the doors open, waking to morning light, and enjoying coffee with uninterrupted views.
Throughout, the layout balances openness with enclosure, ensuring the expansive barn retains a sense of intimacy and comfort. Thoughtfully placed thresholds and enclosed pockets of space enhance the experience of moving through the home, creating a seamless transition between practicality, relaxation, and social engagement.
ENGAGING WITH LANDSCAPE AND LIGHT
The home’s relationship with its surroundings is carefully orchestrated, with each space positioned to engage meaningfully with the sun’s path and the rolling Cotswold landscape. The eastern wing is dedicated to morning rituals, with a gym and morning room positioned to embrace the first light of day, creating a contemplative setting for fitness, yoga, and quiet reflection. To the west, the bar and lounge extend into a covered terrace and outdoor grill area, designed for gathering as the sun dips below the horizon. These opposing edges frame the daily rhythm of family life, reinforcing a dialogue between architecture and nature.
Privacy and shelter also shape the home’s experience. Deep overhangs provide passive solar protection, ensuring year-round comfort whilst framing uninterrupted views across the landscape. The operable timber screens allow the house to transition effortlessly between an enclosed retreat and an expansive, outward-facing home, offering a contemporary response to the ever-changing Cotswold environment. At the heart of this connection to nature are Crittall-style sliding and folding doors, which can be fully retracted to dissolve the boundary between indoors and out. When open, they create a seamless flow between the living spaces and the surrounding landscape, allowing natural light and fresh air to flood the interiors whilst enhancing the sense of openness and immersion in the countryside.
MATERIALITY AND INTERIOR ATMOSPHERE
As part of the design process, we explored two distinct interior approaches, each offering a unique response to the barn’s architectural character whilst remaining deeply connected to its rural heritage.
One embraces a Scandinavian-inspired minimalism, where light, space, and material restraint create a sense of calm and openness. This approach enhances the barn’s original volume, with pale timber finishes, crisp detailing, and Crittall-style glazing reinforcing a clean, airy aesthetic. The materials focus on texture and natural light, creating a floating, pavilion-like quality that feels both expansive and weightless.
The second approach introduces a warmer, more textural palette, layering materials to create a cosier, more enclosed atmosphere. Here, richer timber tones and carefully controlled lighting conditions define the interiors, evoking the character of a traditional rural retreat. Lower window openings allow for a greater sense of intimacy, whilst the variability of glazing offers flexibility in daylight control.
In both concepts, natural materials take centre stage, ensuring a tactile quality that is both visually refined and sensorially rich. Whether embracing the lightness of the floating pavilion-like minimalism or the warmth of a warmer, more grounded rustic aesthetic, the interior design remains deeply tied to the barn’s agricultural origins whilst offering a contemporary, highly considered living environment.
A SUSTAINABLE APPROACH TO CONTEMPORARY RURAL LIVING
Sustainability is woven into the very fabric of the design for this modern country home, shaping both its architecture and its relationship with the landscape. Rather than a complete rebuild, the design preserves much of the barn’s original structure, reducing embodied carbon and maintaining its agricultural character. This fabric-first approach ensures that heritage and sustainability go hand in hand, creating a home that is both environmentally responsible and deeply connected to its rural setting.
Passive design strategies enhance the home’s energy performance without compromising its refined aesthetic. Deep overhanging eaves provide natural shading, minimising overheating in summer whilst allowing low winter sun to warm the interiors. Planting has been carefully considered to help integrate the barn into the rolling Cotswold landscape whilst maintaining uninterrupted views to the north.
White Horse Barn stands as an exemplar of contemporary rural architecture, demonstrating how a simple agricultural structure can be reinterpreted with sensitivity and precision. The design speaks to a lifestyle that is deeply connected to nature, where architecture does not impose but enhances, and where the boundaries between inside and out, light and shadow, retreat and engagement, are carefully orchestrated. As our second collaboration with this client, the project reflects a continued dialogue—one that evolves with their needs, translating our shared understanding of their city home into a refined countryside retreat. More than just a home, White Horse Barn is a considered response to place—rooted in the Cotswold landscape, shaped by the passage of time, and designed for modern country living at its most refined.