Craftworks has added a vaulted ceiling and lower ground floor to a derelict chapel to create this south London house, which is the winner of the 2019 Don't Move, Improve! award.
A simple pitched roof with triangular skylights gives a subtle hint of the dramatic structure now inside the shell of this converted chapel in south London. The home, named The Chapel, has a modern gothic vault reminiscent of the churches of German architect Gottfried Böhm.

Southwark-based architecture studio Craftworks (formerly John Smart Architects) took their cues from religious architecture when transforming the long-abandoned structure ? part of the former Old St John's convent site ? into a new home.
"The unhallowed status became the protagonist for architectural intervention," said Craftworks. "Axis, narthex, fan vault, nave and crossing were recast with similar dwelling archetypes."
Overlooked on all sides, and with strong local opinion on how the chapel should be retained and used, a balance was struck by retaining the outer structure and digging out a new lower ground floor.

"The programme for a family house needed to surgically dovetail into the existing shell, whilst allowing creative freedom within an internal transfiguration," explained the architecture studio.

Four bedrooms, bathrooms and a study sit on the new lower ground floor, while the original space has been entirely given over to an open-plan dining and kitchen area, flooded with light from ...