A Suffolk Barn Home With Soaring Ceilings Listed at $1.95M

Sited on the border of Essex and Suffolk, in the village of Assington—a part of England that inspired the paintings of renowned landscape artist John Constable—this 5,500-square-feet barn conversion was undertaken by respected London-based architect David Nossiter (and was previously featured on Dwell).

The property, which is offered at approximately $1.95 million through The Modern House, has five bedrooms, a living room, and a dining room all arranged around a massive central reception hall, where a kitchen, pantry, WC, and enclosed utility room are located.  

In order to keep the spaces as open as possible, partitions and screens made out of birch-faced plywood were used as over-scaled freestanding furniture. The flooring is polished concrete with 10-millimeter floor joinings that demarcate the various functional zones. 

The master bedroom is spread over two levels and has a WC, shower, and freestanding bath, as well as a dressing area and lounge area that overlooks the adjacent green fields.

Roof slates and timber salvaged from other farm structures on the site were used for the extensive refurbishment of the roof. To maintain good thermal performance while keeping the existing wooden beams visible, wool insulation clad with larch timber was used on the exterior of the roof rather than inside.  

Large glazed sliding doors were constructed to fill the hipped gable porches and frame views of the open fields from within the courtyard. Two 33-square-foot skylights were incorporated into the roof to draw sunlight deep into the interiors of the 26-feet-tall central spaces. 

According to Nossiter, the house is "of cathedral-like proportions," something that rarely seen in residential properties today.