Strathspey Estate | Grantown-on-Spey, Scotland 2018-2020

Grantown-on-Spey is a planned town arranged around a high-street running NE/SW and centred on a civic square. Situated on a subsidiary road off the town centre and next to the Category B Listed Inverallan Kirk, the impetus for this project was to provide financial support for much-needed renovation work to the Kirk to allow it to be used for wider community use. Moxon Architects worked with the Trustees of Inverallan Kirk and the landowner to develop a specific, high-value proposal that addressed housing needs for mid-market and affordable properties as defined in the Cairngorms Local Development Plan.

The site lies just outside the Grantown-on-Spey Conservation area and shares a boundary with the Category B listed Inverallan Church by Alexander Smith Cullen, completed in the late nineteenth century. Four new houses were designed to site sympathetically next to the church while maintaining a sense of privacy to the garden spaces. Careful consideration was made to framing the church when viewed at various points in the village, with gable elevations reflecting the grander elevations of the church. The scheme maximised the ecological possibilities of an otherwise disregarded strip of land by offering a substantial area of planting that extended a popular path network.

A modest palette of timber, render and zinc is used to reflect the local character while at the same time being appropriate to sustainable development and the availability of small contracting firms based within the National Park.