A rock 'n' roll renovation: meet the musician whose double-decker extension in Walthamstow features a kitchen styled on a drumkit

Developer Thomas Courtenay Warner began building houses on his family’s land in Walthamstow at the tail end of the 19th century. His compact, cottage-style homes were aimed at working families moving out to the suburbs.

Much has changed in E17 in the century since and when Harriett and Jeremy Hindmarsh bought a Warner house, it was with the intention of enlarging and upgrading it.

They took their time and did it in style, with a double-decker extension clad in burned wood and featuring a kitchen with a layout inspired by a drum kit.

The couple both work full time, Harriett as corporate vice-president (marketing and communications) at infrastructure firm AECOM, and Jeremy as senior designer at garden landscaping company Lancasters. Neither of them had time to manage the project but now realise this was probably a good thing.

“If I have learned anything it is how little I know and how important it is to have people around you who do,” says Harriett, 47.

The couple love their large, light, stylish home and its unconventional touches. It was shortlisted for the National Home Improvement Council’s George Clarke Medal for the UK’s best home refurbishment, and for the best extension category in both New London Architecture’s Don’t Move, Improve! Awards, and The Architects’ Journal retrofit awards.

It has also stacked up financially. Harriett and Jeremy’s investment of just under £500,000 created an £800,000 to £900,000 home.

Their old home was a two-bedroom flat in Walthamstow and with two golden retrievers, Ella and Charlie, they wanted more space. But their new house, while double-fronted, was only one room deep, with a tiny kitchen, pocket-sized living room, one bathroom and two modest-sized bedrooms.

They paid £242,950 in 2006, right on the cusp of the recession, and initially saw no reason to change it. But between 2012 and 2016 Waltham Forest saw some of the most stellar property price rises in London, 76 per cent according to the Land Registry, so investing in their house made sense.

At about the same time they met Islington-based architect Neil Dusheiko, who was working on another house in their street. They liked his work, and were ready to take on a challenge. Before they finally committed they thought long and hard about whether to move or improve.

“We took the estimated value of our property and had a look at what else we could buy for that… but there was nowhere we found that we really liked,” says Jeremy, 52.

By summer 2016 they were ready to start work. Dusheiko had helped them get planning permission for a two-storey extension clad in charred timber, with space for a new kitchen/dining room on the ground floor and a master bedroom above.

With his clients averse to a boxy, everyday extension, Dusheiko’s design features a complex series of angles. The kitchen roof slopes gently to a pitch above the dining table, while the bedroom above runs half the width of the house, and has its own asymmetrical pitched roof.

The couple decamped to a flat in Forest Gate for the duration of the six-month build.

The location wasn’t handy for site visits, but finding a landlord willing to offer a short let to a couple with two large dogs proved impossible. When a friends’ neighbour offered them the annexe at her house, they jumped at the chance.

The couple have nothing but praise for their architect, and their hard-working builders TBS Tutka Ltd. “It was such a painless experience that I would not mind doing another one, with the same architect and builders,” says Harriett.

Her biggest joy is the huge amount of new home storage. The substantial extension has made it possible to turn the old living room into a home office, while the cramped dining room is now a walkway from the front door to the kitchen, with a wall of cupboards along one side.

The original galley kitchen now holds a utility room, with all the appliances hidden inside more cupboards, and a cloakroom.

Redecorated, the two original upstairs bedrooms are now guest rooms. The couple use the airy new bedroom, with its huge windows and high ceilings. Their bathroom has a showpiece concrete handbasin with a spout tap embedded in the mirror above.

A double skylight keeps the room bright, while smart technology closes the windows automatically if it starts to rain.

The kitchen-diner, a carefully designed industrial/rustic mix, is the star attraction. Jeremy bought reclaimed 19th-century French railway carriage floorboards from Reclaimed Ltd of Chingford and had them converted into full-height sliding doors which add texture to the white-painted walls and grey-tiled floor.

The couple commissioned metalworkers Zmetal of Rainham in Essex to build the dining table and low media unit, while a collection of vintage chairs and a chocolate brown, low-slung sofa keep things cosy.

The kitchen is a particularly successful mixture of materials and bespoke design. The counter is concrete, the cooker and fridge are steel, but the surface of the kitchen island is a big slab of waney-edged oak.

Jeremy is the cook of the household and wanted a small prep sink in the island, as well as a full-sized sink. As a third washing option there is also a trough-shaped “bar sink” embedded into the island.

During the Nineties, Jeremy was the drummer with rock band Swervedriver, and in many ways he has arranged his kitchen like a drum kit — everything he needs is within arm’s length and the units are above-average height so there is no need for him to stoop.

He says: “We did go and look at a lot of ready-made kitchens but a kitchen you have designed yourself works specifically for you and the way you operate.”