Designer Sebastian Cox has designed a treehouse in the English countryside that features scorched larch cladding, a shingled roof and a balustrade of chestnut branches.
Cox's studio created the treehouse in Hertfordshire for the children of a client, who now have a private play area within sight of the family home.
The treehouse is built on an Atlas cedar tree
Made in collaboration with Root and Shoot treehouse builders and engineer Timberwright, the cabin is made from a combination of English ash, sweet chestnut and larch woods.
It sits on the lowest branch of a large Atlas cedar.
It is built on two cantilevered beams
The designers wanted to create a structure that blended into the tree, so they avoided putting in posts extending down to the ground. Instead, the 2.5 by 2.3-metre house is built onto two cantilevered chestnut beams that they called "the chopsticks". It is anchored onto the tree at a minimal four points.
The roof is made of cleft chestnut shakes
Inspired by the "flexibility and strength of medieval buildings", the studio created the treehouse's frame from English ash using pegged mortise and tenon joints, which give it a precision look.
It chose the scorched larch external cladding for its shadowy quality, allowing the treehouse to recede into the tree.

Old-fashioned roof shingles are made from shakes of chestnut wood. Because these are cleft rather than sawn, the shakes have a rough finish.
A balustrade made of chestnut branches from a c...