McGonigle McGrath’s House Lessans was once a small working farmstead, and although it is now a family home, it retains many characteristics of its former life. Two existing structures, a barn and shed, have been enveloped into a humble sprawl of contemporary living spaces that make up the house, which has just been announced as the winner of the RIBA House of the Year 2019 award.
Located in the midst of the green rolling landscape of County Down, House Lessans has refreshingly remastered the original industrial buildings into a friendly settlement. A new forecourt and bedroom block with its own private courtyard evolve the formerly rectangular plan into an L-shaped masterplan.
The simple pitched zinc roofs and embedded concrete plinths lift language from agricultural outbuildings, yet are refined through detailing into contemporary living spaces. Wide windows frame views into the landscape, while subtle shifts in level define changes in the function of space to retain the open volume found in the original barn.
The RIBA House of the Year jury described the house’s ensemble of existing and new buildings as ‘carefully orchestrated’, and commended the architects’ ability to ‘edit’ the architecture: ‘The house belies any notion that an expensive budget is somehow the gateway to excellence,’ says the report.
RELATED STORY
Practicing the values of discipline, minimalism and necessity Belfast-based practice McGonigle McGrath, founded by Kieran McGonigle and Aidan McGrath, allow the quiet rural compound to settle into the landscape and the sloping ‘drumlins’ in the distance to dominate.
Yet while the house is low key, and low rise – it’s barely visible from the overgrown entry lane until you reach the ample front yard, there is warmth and a softer informality woven into the industrial shapes and materials that makes it feel like home.
Perhaps it's the contrast of the buildings against the austere beauty of the landscape and the heaviness of the clouds on a late afternoon in autumn. Perhaps it's the architects’ economic vision that makes this place feel light, and healthy.
‘The architects have shown remarkable restraint and skill in creating a family home that exudes calm, dignity, and generosity,’ summarise the RIBA judges.
INFORMATION
-
How Billecart-Salmon became the hospitality industry’s champagne of choiceNeil Ridley ventures into a subterranean temple to patience and precision beneath the village of Aÿ-Champagne, France, and discovers a winery not of spectacle, but of soul
-
In Baku Sakashita’s new lighting collection, hand-dyed silk threads are delicately illuminatedIn ‘Haku’, ultra-fine LEDs are woven within plant-dyed threads, showcasing intricacy, artistry and traditional Japanese craftsmanship
-
Discover the chic simplicity of CC-Steding jewelleryNic Farnan and Ben Chaplin create delicate silver jewellery in their east London studio
-
You may know it as ‘Dirty House’ – now, The Rogue Room brings 21st-century wellness to ShoreditchThe Rogue Room – set in the building formerly known as Dirty House by Sir David Adjaye, now reinvented by Studioshaw – bridges wellness and culture in London's Shoreditch
-
The architectural innovation hidden in plain sight at Frieze London 2025The 2025 Frieze entrance pavilions launch this week alongside the art fair, showcasing a brand-new, modular building system set to shake up the architecture of large-scale events
-
RIBA Stirling Prize 2025 winner is ‘a radical reimagining of later living’Appleby Blue Almshouse wins the RIBA Stirling Prize 2025, crowning the social housing complex for over-65s by Witherford Watson Mann Architects, the best building of the year
-
‘Belonging’ – the LFA 2026 theme is revealed, exploring how places can become personalThe idea of belonging and what it means in today’s world will be central at the London Festival of Architecture’s explorations, as the event’s 2026 theme has been announced today
-
Join us on a first look inside Regent’s View, the revamped canalside gasholder project in LondonRegent's View, the RSHP-designed development for St William, situated on a former gasholder site on a canal in east London, has just completed its first phase
-
The Royal College of Art has announced plans for renewal of its Kensington campusThe Royal College of Art project, led by Witherford Watson Mann Architects, includes the revitalisation of the Darwin Building and more, in the hopes of establishing an open and future-facing place of creativity
-
Power Hall’s glow-up shines light on science and innovation in ManchesterPower Hall at The Science and Industry Museum in Manchester was given a spruce-up by Carmody Groarke, showcasing the past and future of machines, engineering and sustainable architecture
-
Celebrate the angular joys of 'Brutal Scotland', a new book from Simon Phipps'Brutal Scotland' chronicles one country’s relationship with concrete; is brutalism an architectural bogeyman or a monument to a lost era of aspirational community design?
