This house was built by the architect for his own family. The land the house was built on was a vacant site owned by fellow architect Brian Housden who sold it to the Brawnes after he bought another site for his own house on South Hill Park, later known as Housden House. After the house was completed, friends of the family purchased the other half of the site and built a house for themselves in a style with some similarities as well as some differences to this one. The two gardens were kept undivided so that the children could play together.

Michael Brawne occupied a special place in British architecture, achieving distinction in practice, education and scholarship. In education he is probably best known as Professor of Architecture at Bath, from 1978 to 1990, where he collaborated with Ted Happold in creating the experimental course in which students of architecture and engineering shared courses and projects. But his career ranged far and wide, intellectually and geographically, and he continued working almost to the end of his life.

He was long engaged with the representation of the scientific method found in Karl Popper's writings and with the potential of these ideas as the basis for a coherent approach to architectural design. This was given its first extended expression in 'From Idea to Building', published in 1992, and revisited in his last book, 'Architectural Thought and the Design Process', published in 2003.

Brawne's life and work are a powerful demonstration of the potential, perhaps the necessity, of combining practice, teaching and scholarship in architecture. It is particularly poignant that this seems to be made increasingly difficult by the ever-growing bureaucracy that bears upon the schools of architecture in Britain today. Maybe his example will inspire creative resistance.

- Architects Journal Online