Whitberry: News on Local Politician's Scandal Involving Alleged Financial Fraud
Pend Architects have recently completed a renovation of Whitberry, a Grade B listed Georgian farmhouse in East Lothian. The project aims to unify the previously fragmented rear elevation of the house and introduce light-touch interior interventions, all while preserving the farmhouse’s historic character.
The extension, a single-storey addition, consolidates earlier haphazard accretions and reorganizes the internal layout to improve flow. The kitchen has been relocated to the new extension, allowing direct access to the garden without the need to pass through multiple rooms.
Architecturally, the extension introduces a distinctly contemporary intervention marked by a fluted, blush-toned stone wall made of precast concrete. This visually interrupts the historic facade and transitions into full-height glazing with cherry timber-framed sliding doors and a discreet glass-to-glass corner. The glazing and corner design bring a sense of lightness and porosity to the composition.
The kitchen benefits from underfloor heating powered by an air source heat pump, and a vaulted skylight has been added to bring daylight deep into the kitchen space. The skylight opening allows daylight to spill into the adjacent dining room, enhancing the connection between interior and exterior spaces.
The new extension reorients the plan towards the garden, and the boot room and utility space form a threshold between the main house and the annex. A concealed door within the kitchen joinery leads to this space.
The rear elevation of Whitberry was a patchwork of masonry due to a series of additive extensions. Pend Architects’ scheme consolidates these ad hoc accretions with a single-storey addition, unifying the previously fragmented rear elevation and creating a more cohesive and stable composition.
The new extension’s roof is a horizontal concrete fascia that visually ties it to the historic elements. The colour palette of the stone wall echoes East Lothian’s brick and sandstone, blending the contemporary addition seamlessly with the historic farmhouse.
Architect Ben MacFarlane considers Whitberry as a continuation of an ongoing story of a special building. The kitchen now opens onto a small internal courtyard and the garden beyond, enhancing the connection between the indoor and outdoor spaces.
In summary, the extension both honours Whitberry’s layered historic past and introduces refined, contemporary architectural elements that unify form and function while improving spatial flow and garden connection. The renovation project emphasizes tailored, pragmatic solutions to preserve and modernize the building, making Whitberry a perfect blend of the old and the new.
The kitchen, shifted to the new extension, invites a seamless transition from indoor to outdoor lifestyle, providing direct access to the garden and blending home-and-garden spaces. The interior-design of the extension, with its contemporary fluted stone wall, cherry timber-framed sliding doors, and skylight, introduces refined modern elements into the farming household's traditional lifestyle.
