Case study

Cloud House: A Post-Modern Masterpiece in Gospel Oak

A colorful modern building with a pink facade, featuring curved arches and large windows. The lower part of the building is bordered by a light blue fence, and the street runs alongside it under a partly cloudy sky.
Overview

Featured on Channel 4’s Grand Designs, The Cloud House is a striking post-modern eco-home in Gospel Oak designed by architect Peter Morris for his own family. Glazing Vision was chosen to supply three bespoke, custom-sized Fixed Flushglaze rooflights to flood its colourful, maximalist interior with natural daylight.

Details

Status

Complete

Architect

Peter Morris

Images

Juliet Murphy

At its heart, The Cloud House is a deeply personal project, the fulfillment of a lifelong dream for architect Peter Morris to design and build a bespoke home for his own family, in close collaboration with his wife, Emily, who project managed the build. From the outset, Peter set out to create a space driven by pure joy, playfulness, and imagination, making a “seismic departure" from his typical architectural design work.

Designing for himself allowed him to push creative boundaries without compromise, turning a standard site into an impressive pink-arched masterpiece that serves both as a family retreat and an uplifting visual gift to the Gospel Oak community.

The home sits between a heritage-listed school and a modern, brick home on a street that has buildings in a variety of architecture styles. Even with the vast array of architecture in the area, the project took four years to be granted full planning permission.

A colorful, modern building with a pink facade and turquoise accents stands beside a stone structure. A person walks past on the street, under a partly cloudy sky.

The Vision & Architecture

Described by architect and owner Peter Morris as a building designed to "bring joy and delight to the neighbourhood," The Cloud House is a spectacular, boundary-pushing project in North London. The pair of semi-detached eco-homes are an unmissable architectural statement, characterised by a pale pink facade, a striking cloud-shaped roofline, and sweeping neo-gothic arches.

Taking cues from the Grade-I listed St Martin's Church opposite and embracing the vibrant "New London Fabulous" design trend, the project is a masterclass in exuberance. It swaps the white-walled subtlety of traditional modernism in favour of a vibrant, maximalist aesthetic meant to prompt a smile from anyone who walks by.

A pink sculptural installation in the foreground with a historic clock tower visible in the background under a cloudy sky.

The Arches

It was the arches at St Martin's Church, which stands opposite the site that informed the houses' many arches, which are constructed from a dense recyclable polystyrene and repeated in 1.2 meter patterns.

Morris embraced the concept of a building being sculpturally decorated on the outside as much as the inside. This structural exuberance sets the tone before you even step through the front door.

The arched forms extend into the home’s interior architecture, featuring bespoke arched doorways, sweeping barrel-vaulted ceilings, curved joinery, and custom scalloped plaster cornices that mirror the building's exterior aesthetic.

A modern building with a wavy, pink exterior featuring large arched windows. The structure has a unique architectural design, contrasting with nearby traditional buildings, under a blue sky with fluffy clouds.

Upside-Down Living

To maximise natural daylight and views, Morris opted for an "upside-down" layout across the three storeys, with bedrooms on the lower floors and living spaces on the upper floors, in addition to a south-facing roof terrace complete with sun loungers and a freestanding teak bath.

The clever layout ensures that the heart of the home remains continuously bathed in natural light throughout the day.

A vibrant kitchen interior featuring bold green and pink striped walls, colorful furniture, and playful decor. A centrally placed island with a pink countertop holds decorative items, including a fruit bowl. Sunflowers and small plants add a touch of nature, while a skylight brightens the space.

A Carefully Considered Design

Both the exterior and interior colour scheme for the homes was drawn from the Art Deco architecture of Miami, where the couple enjoyed their honeymoon. On the facades, pale pink arches are combined with pale green metalwork.

Inside the home, the floors utilise pale-blue poured resin whilst pink and white marquee stripes run across the walls and ceilings.

A view looking up at a pink-striped building with round windows, framed by a colorful architectural design. The sky is visible through the opening above.

Skyward Living

In a project where natural daylight is designed to "dance" through the interior, overhead glazing was critical to illuminating the floor plan. Glazing Vision was selected to supply and install three highly specified rooflights for the project, each playing a vital role in the home's luminous aesthetic:

Three Fixed Flushglaze Rooflights are installed over the open-plan kitchen and living space, providing an abundance of natural daylight into the space below, creating the perfect atmosphere for both relaxing and entertaining.

Because the home features such a highly unconventional layout and roofline, each of the three rooflights was manufactured to a different custom size to suit the specific architectural demands of the spaces below.

With a low-E coating and argon-filled cavity, our fixed rooflights actively contribute to the building's stringent eco-credentials

A vibrant kitchen interior featuring pink, green, and blue elements. The design includes striped ceilings, colorful cabinetry, and a central island with yellow accents. Decor elements like plants and decorative objects enhance the lively atmosphere.

Sustainability & Eco-Credentials

Despite its playful, unconventional aesthetics, The Cloud House is heavily grounded in environmental responsibility. The building achieves near-Passivhaus levels of airtightness and insulation. Working in tandem with the thermal efficiency of Glazing Vision rooflights, the property utilises an air source heat pump for underfloor heating and a grey-water recycling system, ensuring the home is as highly sustainable as it is visually striking.

As The Cloud House makes its debut on Grand Designs, it stands as a bold example of maximalist design and architectural joy. Glazing Vision is proud to have played a role in executing Peter Morris’s vision, delivering three bespoke fixed rooflights that capture natural light from above and illuminate the vibrant, intricate details of this extraordinary London home.

Inspired by Grand Designs?

Transform your own home with high-performance, daylight-maximising overhead glazing. Get in touch with Glazing Vision today or call 01379 658 300 to request a free quote for your bespoke rooflight project.

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