At the heart of the classical language of architect are the ideas of proportion and symmetry. These drive the elegant looks of buildings designed in this language.

The benefits of the correct use of proportion and symmetry are illustrated nicely by this family home in Wiltshire. Careful balance is needed to create an elegant home and the successful result remains a popular project in our portfolio.

You don’t always need a huge amount of information to convey the sense of a space, place or set of buildings. Computer Generated Images have their place, but sometimes it is as much about what you leave out as much as you leave in.

These sketch visuals of an infill housing scheme in Buckinghamshire are not ultra realistic, but they still give the overall impression of the feeling of the development. A collection of traditionally styled houses give the feeling of a series of homes which have been part of the village, rather than new introductions.

Analysis of a site can tell you a lot of things which can inform and shape the design of a building. Where are the views? Where is the prevailing weather coming from?

The start point of this project in Oxfordshire, as a result of our analysis, was to create a building which sheltered the entrance from the prevailing winds. The exposed site meant that without this, anyone arriving at the house would find it a rather gusty experience. Not the best first impression…

Whilst beautifully rendered watercolour drawings are excellent as presentation drawings, sometimes the artistic qualities of a sketch conveys the idea being discussed and we often produce concept sketches to communicate the interior ambiance and spaces we are designing.

This sketch is of a vaulted kitchen breakfast room as part of the remodelling of a large country house in West Berkshire.

We do love a hand drawing here and we’ve been looking back through the archives recently to find our favourites.

This is one of Alex’s favourites. This elegant pair of gate lodges we designed for a country estate in Hampshire are, at the same time, both subservient to the main house, but still give the impression of what it will be like. The Georgians used gate lodges to signify the gravitas of their country houses, but still always remembered the fact that they were service buildings. A tricky balance, but one we are delighted to have struck here.

We’ve been looking at the INTBAU charter recently, which contains some interesting principles on placemaking and architecture.

One of these is “through tradition we can preserve our sense of identity and counteract social alienation”. This scheme for a market town in Wiltshire aimed to replace an alien industrial style building with a building which brought a sense of identity to the riverside location, whilst being in keeping with the architectural identity of the town at large.

When working on old buildings a straight line is a rarity. Historic structures wobble, are out of plumb and are curved by the hands that made them.

The trick, when undertaking conservation work is to not fight this. Going with the fact the building is out of square keeps your intervention to a minimum and makes for a more authentic result. We took this approach for this Grade II listed Devonshire Linhay we worked on a few years ago and these pencil drawings we produced as part of the design process show how wonky some parts of the building were. All part of the charm.

A ratio of 1:1.6180339887 doesn’t sound very glamorous, but this ratio, better known at the Golden Ratio, or the Divine Proportion underpins Classical architecture.

We take this principle very seriously and it underpins our work in the New Classical genre. This new house we designed in Hampshire has elevations carefully designed to Gold Ratio proportions. The result is a truly aesthetically pleasing family home which is a much admired part of our portfolio.

We have a passion for old buildings and are lucky enough to work on lots of interesting pieces of historic architecture. We always base our schemes on thorough historic research, such as this report recently completed by our very own Gemma Kingsbury on the former Harris Bacon Factory Social Club in Calne.

We also like to share our knowledge, so we've lodged a copy of the three volumes we produced at the Calne Heritage Centre for future reference by all.