The Cloud House: plans for Millennial pink Disney-style home revealed by Camden architect
A fairy tale home in millennial pink, to be known as The Cloud House, is the dream of a north London architect.
Peter Morris and his TV producer wife, Emily Kennedy, have applied to Camden council planners for permission to demolish their Victorian house in Gospel Oak and build the extravagantly arched building in its place.
They plan to create the four-bedroom, semi-detached house with a rooftop plunge pool, for themselves and their 14-year-old daughter to live in, and another three-bedroom house next door to sell.
Mr Morris was inspired by the tall, thin arches of the nearby Church of St Martin. Built in 1865, the Grade I-listed church was described by architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner (1902-83) as “the craziest of London’s Victorian churches”, due mainly to its incomplete-looking towers and William Morris stained-glass windows.
Peter Morris says the church pinnacles resemble those of “a classic Disney castle”. He adds: “The street is very eclectic, there’s not one style on the street and that gave me more confidence to be a bit more flamboyant than if it were a street of Georgian terraced houses. A lot of people say the design is quite Art Deco-style, others have said it looks like a mosque. I wasn’t directly influenced by either of those things but I can see what they mean.”
Digital designs show a house unlike any other in central London, with the multiple arches across the façade giving the building the silhouette of a simplified drawing of a cloud – hence the house’s name.
The choice of buff pink walls with teal window frames and metalwork was inspired by the famous Art Deco architecture of Miami, where Mr Morris and his wife spent their honeymoon. The family plan to make the interiors even bolder, with contrasting colours and patterns and polka-dot tiles followed through from the roof.
“My wife and daughter have had a lot of impact on the design. My daughter’s really keen, she’s got lots of ideas how to design her room, although it changes about every fortnight. At the moment it’s like a trendy café with bean bags, cacti and pale blues and pinks,” Mr Morris says.
Neighbours have been largely supportive of the scheme, with responses to the planning application commending the “flair and creativity of the design”.
However, not all residents are in favour. One described the plan as “an unsightly eyesore”, adding: “Ugly, unpopular buildings resulting from the thoughtless whims of architects are appearing all over the borough and all over London, and more cannot be encouraged.”
The borough of Camden contains several unique architect-designed modern homes, including 2 Willow Road, the Thirties terrace house of prominent modernist architect Erno Goldfinger, which is now a National Trust attraction, and the Isokon Building, the sculptural Thirties apartment block that was home to crime writer Agatha Christie, German architect Walter Gropius, founder of the Bauhaus School, and Soviet spy Arnold Deutsch.