The existing red-brick building was built by LCC Architects in 1974 as part of the Arden estate in Hackney. Stylistically, it borrows from Scandinavian social housing, particularly in the use of slanted glass walls. For their third-storey extension, Lynch Architects referenced the pattern of the glazing to create a studio which, according to Grand Designs magazine, “is so in keeping with the existing buildings that it looks like it’s been there for years.”

In Architecture Today, February 2006, Chris Foges wrote: “The existing house is composed of a double skin of brick with floors on timber joists. With foundations specified to take the dead loads of a concrete roof and ring-beam, the addition of a new storey in kiln-dried softwood did not require any remedial action below ground. The frame was prefabricated in sections, craned onto the roof and erected on the existing parapet wall, which becomes a ply-clad sill on the interior. The racking strength of the ply sheathing compensates for an absence of cross-bracing, and close-spacing of the slender columns obviates the need for secondary glazing bars.

“Columns and beams have the same dimensions, resulting in a deep roof and fascia, which Lynch likens to a table top. The corners are treated as table legs and clad, like the fascia, in stainless steel, thereby resolving the Miesian dilemma of column junctions at the corner. The table cloth, in this metaphor, is the cladding of clear and obscured glass. Backed by either ply shutters or white-painted rigid insulation, it acts by day and by night as a varying patchwork of dark grey, orange and opalescent panels.”

The project has also achieved recognition internationally. The magazine L’Architecture D’Aujourd’hui wrote: “London is a city that is well acquainted with the construction of towers; they have transformed the outline of this city like no other. Through the addition of a new storey, architects Patrick and Claudia Lynch have brought about a metamorphosis of their home and place of work in the listed district of Hackney. This construction has two benefits: the original building, an ordinary 1970s house, has been extended while the architects’ studio now occupies a large space flooded with natural light.”

Lynch Architects is an award winning practice based in Hackney in London, run by Patrick and Claudia Lynch. Recipients of The Young Architect of the Year Award 2005, they were also exhibited in the official selection of the Venice Architectural Biennale in 2012, and in the Irish Pavilion in 2008. Their work ranges from individual houses and residential and commercial developments to arts and community projects. Working at a variety of scales, from master plans to interior design, they pay close attention to the social, ecological, historical and economic aspects of places. They believe that good design derives from the search for a poetic economy of means.

Patrick Lynch studied at Liverpool, Lyon and Cambridge universities, and Claudia studied in Dresden, Liverpool and London. Patrick taught at Kingston University in 1997-2003, at the Architectural Association in 2001-2003, and at London Metropolitan University in 2005-2007. Claudia worked for many years in the offices of Michael Willford and Partners and van Heyningen and Haward.