Noel Kingsbury

'The Pavilion'

A contemporary eco-vernacular building project.

‘The Pavilion’ is an annexe – an eco-building we designed in collaboration with green builder Jim Wallis, of the Alternative Building Company. In 2005 we moved to near Hay on Wye (the second hand book town on the England-Wales border) and decided we needed more accommodation than was available in the house. ‘We’ by the way is myself and my partner Jo Eliot.

The Pavilion houses my office, a workshop and guest suite. It is built with an innovative form of construction – straw-clay, and is one of the first such buildings of this kind to be erected in Britain. Inside a conventional timber-frame is a filling of a mixture of chopped straw and clay slip, this is rendered with a traditional lime-sand render and then limewashed. The whole thing is an example of an innovative combination of hi- and lo- technologies. Having the clay mixed into the straw allows for superior thermal qualities to a strawbale building, which of course is much better than a conventional build. Like a lot of good things, the technology is from Germany, and is a modern take on traditional buildings.

Straw-clay gives the builder/designer much more scope for moulding and detailing than strawbale. Wall niches and curves are a particularly attractive feature. In design terms the inspirations include: Anglo-Indian Hill Station architecture, Adirondack, adobe and Victorian railway station. A stained glass window is derived from American Craftsman style, and was made by local craftsman Jim Budd.