Minimalist Barn in Cambridgeshire

Rising from the fens of Cambridgeshire is a solid old barn converted to a minimalist home and work space. Old Victorian bricks add an industrial element while OSB defines spaces with the larger void and is used to create furniture. The stark, restricted exterior is warmed by an inner lining of OSB echoing the idea of straw bales. Minimalist rustic, bold, simple, adaptive. Old and new melting into farmyard. The old Ochre barn and its new Stealth barn by Carl Turner Architects.

Sitting in the exposed expanse of the Cambridgeshire fens, the Stealth Barn is a bold, simple form, reminiscent of the barn it accompanies. Built as a guest house, studio or meeting place, depending on time of year and workloads: the Stealth Barn is also a retreat, a place of inspiration and enjoyment.

Placed perpendicular to the existing barn, it stands to create and define a slightly more sheltered and casual garden which melts into the fens, a hint at the memory of a former farm yard. Stealth Barn is a sharp black mass – a shadow of the adjacent barn or a silhouette on the horizon. It is a robust exterior wrapped with a restricted palette, devoid of fussy detail, and formed to withstand its exposed position.

The interior inverts this toughness through the use o warmer OSB wrapping fully around the space to form angles reminiscent of the adjacent barns divided with straw bales. It creates an immersive interior landscape.

The Stealth Barn was shortlisted for the Architect’s Journal Small Projects 2012.

Photography by Damian Russell, Tim Crocker and Jeremy Phillips