Handen Road

This detached Victorian villa in a conservation area in Lewisham was dark, damp and disconnected from its own garden before Selencky Parsons Architects reworked it. A reclaimed brick extension slots into a two-storey cut at the rear, with high slot windows letting it sit lightly against the original house, and a thin steel-framed sliding door mirrored in fixed glazing alongside it.

Moving the staircase down to the lower ground floor opened up the flow of the house and the views across the garden, and pulling part of the upper ground floor back from the extension's glazing line created a mezzanine — adding height and drama while letting light reach all the way down. The result was shortlisted for Don't Move, Improve 2020.