Bringing modernity into a pastoral setting can be a delicate balancing act. Good design doesn?t reside exclusively in cities, nor should it ? but when rural residents want to update their homes and outbuildings with modern style and amenities, they must consider the ways the new structures will contrast with the pre-existing architecture and the land itself. The sparseness of built environments in the countryside automatically lends every choice more weight, upping the potential to produce a result that feels jarring or alien in its context.

On Scotland?s Isle of Man, a new country home by Foster Lomas expertly blends periods and materials for an effect that?s thoroughly modern yet very much a product of its environment. Set just down the hillside from an existing structure known as Cloud 9, the Sartfell Retreat was designed with utmost sensitivity to the landscape and vernacular architecture in mind. Cloud 9 is itself a local landmark, and its renovation was part of the building project. ?The client, a couple whose background combines biological science, medicine, and education, and who also share a passion for birdwatching, created a brief with a long-term strategy for the restoration, conservation, and management of the seven and a half acres of Nature Reserve on Sartfell Mountain,? explain the architects.

?Foster Lomas? response to the site goes back to [our] research and experience of drystone construction whilst working in the Abruzzo region of Italy. Building on ...