The gentle brutalism of Upper Lawn, a rural retreat in the Wiltshire countryside

[Celerity]

https://www.themodernhouse.com/journal/my-modern-house-upper-lawn/



The Modern House Magazine is an exploration into how to live in more beautiful and thoughtful ways – and you can now purchase issues No.2 and No.3 together. To celebrate, we’re sharing an edited version of a story on Upper Lawn, which we featured in our second issue. Upper Lawn was Alison and Peter Smithson’s brutalist “camp box” in the Wiltshire countryside. The stripped-back structure, with no bedrooms and few luxuries, offered peace, quiet and the opportunity to live in rhythm with the seasons. Here, Lucy Drane, Senior Appraisals Specialist for The Modern House, discovers a brutalist folly whose underlying principles of simplicity, connection to nature and slow living are as relevant today as they were in the 1960s.



It was 1958 when Alison and Peter Smithson acquired Upper Lawn: a derelict thatched cottage with a demolition order. The house was one of a group of stone buildings set in the remains of an 18th-century farm worker’s yard, once forming part of ‘The Lawns’ on William Beckford’s estate at the edge of Fonthill Abbey. Upper Lawn, or Solar Pavilion as it was previously known, is perhaps the smallest project of the architect couple and pioneers of British brutalism – but this modest house in Wiltshire, their rural retreat for over two decades, came to embody some of their most significant ideas.



As Peter put it, Upper Lawn was “a device for trying things out on oneself”. Here, they trialled products and materials which were not yet permitted for use in London and explored concepts on a small scale; the most successful of which would later be applied to more expansive projects in the city. By 1960 Alison and Peter had built a two-storey pavilion onto Upper Lawn’s original stone walls. Rather than razing the structure, the existing elements were repurposed, encouraging new ways of looking at historical foundations.



The lower half of the original cottage provided a framework for the new floor-to-ceiling, timber-framed glass walls above; a spectacular piano nobile with an almost 360-degree panorama across the valley. Glazing was extensive, since experimentation in solar gain, which garnered varying levels of success, was a significant part of their process. They had aimed to create “a simple climate house” within which they could experience firsthand the inclement weather conditions of the English seasons. The space was sparsely furnished, and they likened their way of living here to “camping in the landscape”. The kitchen had a sink and a dishwasher but no cooking facilities; instead, they cooked on a stove outside, and at night the whole family rolled out mattresses on the first floor to sleep. They completed their work in 1962 and enjoyed Upper Lawn as a counterpoint to the city; an English folly that their young family could retreat to enjoy a slower, rural pace of life.