Bird in Hand House, Hampstead Mixed-Use Real Estate, North London Building Redevelopment, Architecture Photos
Bird in Hand in Hampstead
22 Aug 2021
Design: Patalab Architecture
Location: Hampstead, London, England, UK

Bird in Hand House
Architecture often begins with understanding and embracing the constraints of a particular brief and site. This proved especially true for the reconfiguration and extension of an existing building in Hampstead, where – given its prominent yet nestled position between Hampstead High Street and Bird in Hand Yard – space was considerably confined.

The Bird in Hand, once a local watering hole of Hampstead until it changed hands to The Dome cafe in the early 80?s and later Cafe Rouge, is a five-storey Victorian structure, which included two cramped flats to the upper floors, accessed via an external escape stair to the rear. It has been refurbished and extended to create two two-bedroom flats to the upper floors, offices to the first floor and flexible retail / restaurant spaces to the ground and basement floors.
The constraints informed a spatially economical yet refined approach to all aspects of the design; from the overall structural arrangement to the construction details. Working in close collaboration with structural engineers Michael Hadi Associates, this approach was articulated most elegantly through the evolution of the rear extension design.

The resolution of the mezzanine support led to distributing the structural...