Project for a new house and the refurbishment of a Georgian house at Summer Hill, Spark Bridge near Ulverston. The picture was taken in January 2010 immediately prior to the Phase ll refurbishment of historic building.

We are designing two new care homes for the Newquay Growth Area proposed by the Duchy of Cornwall. The drawing shows elevations of a care home for the adult mentally ill. The building will accommodate thirty residents in a scheme which includes public and private courtyards that will integrate the community with the wider settlement.

The Buildings of England, Lancashire: North by Clare Hartwell and Nikolaus Pevsner is a survey of the most significant buildings in this area since Roman times. We are well represented in the book having perhaps the most entries of any contemporary architectural practice in Lancashire.

Selected excerpts

Preston: Outer, East: THE TRIANGLE. No. 3 is a house built in stages between 1967 and 2000 by Francis Roberts Architects. Apart from the latest swimming pool addition (2000), off to one side (somewhat classical in flavour), it looks all of a piece and very individual. It would be hard to identify the earliest part, yet nothing smacks immediately of the 1960s. A plot of uneven ground is exploited to create a layered effect. Dominant accents are the plain rendered walls, copper roofs, the raised windows and funnel-like roof-lights. Inside the juxtaposition of low, friendly, faintly Scandinavian rooms with plenty of timber, the outer spaces with views, and tall top-lit spaces in circulation areas (and some other places) is very effective.

Blackpool: ST. CHRISTOPHER, Hawes Side Lane. 1989-91, by Francis Roberts Architects,
Who aptly describes the style as ‘My interpretation of Arts and Crafts or picturesque functionalism’. There are debts to Lutyens, but the style is convincingly Roberts’s own, obviously modern, imaginative and responsive to the site and its surroundings.

On the Blackburn Cathedral Precinct development: The DIOCESAN OFFICES are in the former CHURCH SCHOOL, SW, a quite sizeable, asymmetrical Gothic building of 1870-1 by Frederick Robinson of Derby. They are to be relocated in new buildings on the s side of the Cathedral by Francis Roberts Architects…The proposals envisage the provision of clergy accommodation and private apartments around public and private open spaces. The design drawings show buildings of traditional forms, to be finished in stone and render. They will no doubt exhibit the usual intelligence and restraint of the practice.

The Willows Presbytery fourteen years after completion.

Our scheme for new houses for the at Poundbury, near Dorchester, has been submitted for Planning Permission. The five houses are arranged around a central courtyard with the two houses on St John’s Way forming a strong face to the road and a gateway to the remaining three houses.

Poundbury

Fisher House Farm near Chorley, Lancashire is a three hundred year old Grade ll listed farmhouse that has been gradually falling into a ruinous state. The roof is missing and only three external walls remain. For many years our client was refused consent to rebuild and use the building. This year, following our work alongside Planning Consultant Nigel Robinson, our scheme for the careful reuse of the structure has been granted planning permission.

Summer Hill, Spark Bridge, Cumbria with Morecambe Bay in the distance. Phase 1 complete. Pictures taken in changing light, November 2007.

A drawing of the west end of Blackburn Cathedral showing our scheme for a New Deanery, offices and clergy housing.

For more images click here.

Work is nearing completion on our scheme for the rebuilding and renovation of the Ave Maria Hall and St Winefride’s Hospice in Holywell, North Wales. The Hospice will provide accommodation for pilgrims visiting the holy well nearby. The Hall will be a residence and chapel for the Brigittine Order whose members will care for the pilgrims.

Current project: An initial scheme for apartments in a listed Georgian house near Ulverston. The scheme aims to retain and enhance the grand architectural features of the interior. Phase 1.