Raby House is a complex building made up of an original small stone cottage and a large and dominating Victorian extension which has an enigmatic presence set off the main road into Glen Maye.

The project has seen the renovation of the cottage and Victorian parts of the building along with the demolition of a small section of infill construction to the rear. We have designed a new section in this area containing a kitchen, library and garden room and more effectively linking the parts of the house.

The main principle adopted for the new extension was that it should respect the proportion, form and appearance of the existing dwelling, whilst not being a pastiche. The result balances the change in scale between the earlier parts of the house through an clearly modern section that takes its cue from vernacular forms.

The principal element of the modest extension is a mono pitch roof that comes off the rear roof of the cottage and terminates in a gable wall with a new chimney stack, setting off and balancing the remaining chimney stacks.

Although separated from the Victorian extension, the roof pitch of this new element is similar, echoing outlying low structures in the landscape and the slope of the land.

A largely glazed, flat-roofed two storey section, with a projecting balcony, links the mono-pitch section of the new extension to the Victorian part. This connecting structure incorporates a section of rebuilt external stonework within the space.

The extension contains an open plan kitchen dining area on the first floor with direct access onto a terrace with views to the south west. This space opens onto an internal gallery and down to a garden room on the ground floor. Between the garden room and Victorian extension, beneath the kitchen dining area, is a library.

The materials for the extension are a combination of  those found on site. The triangle of the gable is glazed with timber vertical louvres located in front of the glazing, providing shading, and giving the appearance externally of a solid wall from certain angles; they also direct the internal view toward the sea. 

The connecting structure between the mono-pitch and Victorian extension is more lightweight with aluminium-framed windows and vertical timber boarding to the balcony, matching the adjacent louvres. The timber is unfinished and will silver in colour over time.

The house has been brought back into use following a period of decline and dereliction with the new addition forming the 21st century chapter in the building’s story.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

2019 RIBA NW Regional Awards • shortlisted 2020 Civic Trust Awards regional finalist

Market Hall is a regeneration project that has put a much loved building back at the heart of Douglas. Providing new premises for a well established local retailer, Bikestyle, and for the local produce phenomenon, NOA Bakehouse, the Victorian market hall building, has undergone extensive refurbishment and had a thoroughly modern refit.

horncastle:thomas were project architects, working with Brinkworth Design to deliver the refurbishment of the building plus provision of a new structure that contains the service spaces on the ground floor, additional retail space and smaller meeting and consultant rooms on the upper floor. The new elements are clad in Douglas Fir Plywood and sit in clear contrast to the refurbished Victorian windows, ironwork and stone and brickwork.

More recently the Biksestyle space has been taken over by Santander Work Cafe. The modifications to the spaces, which now includes co-working spaces, meeting spaces and cash machines, were designed by the Santander in-house team; we provided assistance with the Registered Building and Building Control applications.

The Market Halls (this building, the former butchers’ market) along with the British Legion, former fish and butter market) are Registered Buildings (120).

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

This is a modest building but in a prominent location, forming part of the setting for Castle Rushen and the Baillie Scott Castletown Police Station on Castletown harbourside.  The project sees a redundant Registered Building (26), converted and brought back into reuse to be tenanted as a coffee shop, bringing significant improvements to the public realm.  

The building has been altered internally, forming a single space for the coffee shop under the main section of roof, and a coherent space for the counter and back of house, below the outrigger. The building has been extended into a former yard space with a ribbon window and lead flat roof over the quarterdeck wall so that customers are able to enjoy a coffee overlooking the harbour. 

As with our landscaping scheme at nearby Rushen Abbey, the materials and forms for the seats and planters are robust and simple, blocks of concrete and corten steel.  The limestone paving matches that used in the recent improvements to Castletown Square and this space forms an important addition to the town’s network of small public spaces.

Planning and Registered Building applications were approved in 2015; the main contract building works and landscaping improvements were completed in 2016 and the building handed over for the tenant to fit-out.

A further application was submitted and approved in 2019 to enable the sculpture of Capt John Quilliam by Bryan Kneale MBE RA to be moved from the Speaker’s Garden at Castle Rushen to its new location on the Quaterdeck.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

A new-build house on the site of a very small dilapidated Manx cottage, Rose Cottage makes best use of the sloping site and works on two levels: the road behind and the wooded garden level below. Although the site is extensive, the appropriate response is a dwelling of modest proportion.

The form refers to the simple aesthetic of the Manx cottage with clear and simple modern spaces and detailing. The plan is also simple: a single-living-space at the upper level with mezzanine, opening onto a kitchen terrace with 3 bedrooms at the lower level.

The roadside elevation gives little away, is economic in detail and modest in scale, in line with its neighbours. The front door opens into one large space open to the pitch of the roof, containing kitchen, living and dining spaces and a mezzanine deck . The lower- floor bedrooms all have full-height windows opening onto the woodland garden. Bi-fold doors open the kitchen onto a terrace and a large picture window in the living space looks into the tree tops. The mezzanine dormer looks over the trees towards Snaefell. This is a house well connected to its landscape.

The house is well insulated with high levels of air-tightness. It is constructed using insulated concrete formwork (ICF) and has a mechanical ventilation heat recovery system, all with the aim of reducing energy costs.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

Castle Rushen is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and Registered Building (24) and is amongst the best examples of medieval castles in the British Isles.

This project makes improvements to the accessibility to the castle’s keep and also provides a new entrance ticket area and shop.

The new bridge offers some indication, to the curious visitor, of how the original drawbridge functioned, the configuration of decking boards and handrails making the sections distinct.

A ramp, steps and new timber deck in the keep provide level access to the new Manx National Heritage exhibition charting the castle’s construction and history. The materials for the bridge and ramps sit in muted background to the castle, oak handrails, galvanised steel rails, corten steel and timber ramps and decks.

At the end of the barbican entrance to the castle, the stone archways of the outer guard house have been enclosed to form a new ticket area and shop. Painted steel arches provide a simple and neutral frame to new glazing and glazed doors and a new oak floor provides level access through this area.

Approvals were granted in October 2017 and the project was completed the following May.

Manx National Heritage made a short film of the castle which walks over the drawbridge and also flies over the top and into the keep.

More recently, we have assisted Manx National Heritage with a refurbishment of the former Court House, partially reinstating the vaulted ceiling and refurbishing the roof lantern. This work was undertaken in time to host the investiture of the 31st Lieutenant Governor of the Isle of Man in July 2021.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

A renovation and extension for a small historic terraced house in the Crofts in the Castletown Conservation Area.

The property was in poor condition and, as well as the addition of a modern living spaces and a separate garden room, the project extended to include a complete refurbishment of the house.

The walls were repointed externally and stripped back to the limestone internally. A breathable wood-fibre insulation was used to improve the efficiency of the walls; the roof coverings and structure were replaced and the roof well insulated, forming a new attic bedroom and bathroom.

The front windows were poor quality timber-framed single-glazed sash windows; these were replaced with new slim-line double-glazed sash windows that better match the original glazing pattern. The glazing bar profiles were adapted from an original sash window that had survived in one of the rear bedrooms and the mop-handle frame detail was replicated from one of the neighbouring properties.

There are three elements to the extension of the house: a main living/ dining/ kitchen space to replace the original garden outrigger; a new upper floor bathroom accessed from the half-landing on the original staircase; a new home-office/ garden room at the far end of the garden. Construction materials were selected to complement those already found in the Conservation Area, the zinc roof and cladding sitting nicely against the unrendered limestone and natural slate.

Ramsey’s Catholic Church + Presbytery, a Registered Building (80), was designed by Sir Giles Gibert Scott and built in 1908-09. This is an important landmark on the Ramsey shore and a very significant building for the Isle of Man.

This project, for the Friends of Our Lady Star of the Sea and St Maughold, proposes a modest and simple extension along the Presbytery side of the walled garden. New brick walls take their cue from the hue of the coarse Manx stone of the building and the finer detail brickwork around the windows. Fully glazed onto the garden, the extension will provide much-needed additional space for this busy community building.

Planning and Registered Building Consent granted September 2019.

This project encompassed two elements: a renewal of the glazing to the control tower staircase and the construction of a lobby either side of the tower and to the rear of the TT Grandstand.

The lobbies are each formed by a new brick wall facing the rear with a flat roof and glazed screen enclosing the space behind.  The brickwork is a Flemish bond with the headers set to protrude from the face.  The brick generally matches the existing engineering brickwork but the headers are in a softer, darker, more tactile, material. In this way, the new parts of the building are made visible.

A new ramp, carefully detailed in matching brick, goes some way towards making the building more accessible.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

A scheme to improve the link between a new carpark layout and the entrance to the Abbey site.  The proposal clears a path and orientates the visitor to the visible remains of the Abbey, cutting across with a simple set of forms and materials; a line of fruit trees and a setting for a new external section of the Abbey exhibit drawn between the Abbey and the lost tea rooms and dance hall.

The likely presence of un-investigated archeology played a role in the process and the scheme was designed with minimal disturbance to the ground. Concrete block paving was lifted and re-used to suit the new configuration, the new trees were planted in the large corten planters rather than straight into the ground and the infill area of decking is above the ground level.

Phase_01 completed March 2014

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

This three storey plus basement house at Peveril Terrace in Peel was in need of refurbishment. The layout of the house had remained largely unchanged since its completion in 1861, though the kitchen had been moved from the basement to a rear extension in the 1960s.

Our proposals replaced this extension with a modern top-lit kitchen space, a utility and WC to the rear and a large window and and glazed door to the yard at the side.

The roof of the kitchen is pitched on all sides and has a lantern rooflight at it centre, providing excellent levels of natural light to the new space. As well as updating the main bathroom in the house, work was done to upgrade the main roof and the curved roofs of the dormers. The pebbledash render on the front of the house was removed and the sandstone re-rendered using lime render.

We have undertaken a preliminary study for the conversion of this stunning barn in a village 55miles south west of Prague in the Czech Republic.  Accommodation will include a small guest apartment, a  greenhouse, a workshop and space for a table tennis table.

Study completed 2015

ThornBank is a registered building (164) designed by the arts + crafts architect M. H. Baillie Scott; the end house of Falcon Cliff Terrace, built in 1897.

This first phase of the works has addressed essential repairs to roof, dormer and attic windows, rainwater goods and some external works to mitigate against damp in the walls.  A second phase has carried out repairs to a number of the windows.

Due to the historic nature and significance of the building, the repairs were carried out with a minimum loss and impact on materials. 

Phase 01 completed 2015 • phase 02  2016

Planning and Registered Building applications for a future phase, to restore the interior of the building and make some modest alterations to allow its use as a holiday rental, were approved in 2020.

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

Braeside + Leafield are a pair of semi-detached houses designed by the renowned arts + crafts architect M. H. Baillie Scott, built speculatively by the Douglas Bay Estate Co.  Both are on the register of protected buildings (123 + 124).

The scheme proposesd to combine the houses into a single larger dwelling, adding a garden extension containing a swimming pool to the rear and a replacement garage to the front of the property.

We undertook research on the larger house layouts that Baillie Scott had subsequently worked on, also visiting his former home in Bedford (a similar combination of two semi-detached houses) to inform the proposed plan. The plans included the formation of a panelled hall at the entrance, the panels being the visible element to define the alterations and link the two houses; an earlier extension to Braeside, which had infilled the service yard, would be demolished and rebuilt with a more appropriate clearer visual definition, and the Leafield service yard would be infilled to mirror the changes.

The Planning and Registered Building applications were unanimously approved at planning committee but this decision was overturned at appeal and the scheme remains unbuilt.

The first BREEAM 'Excellent' office building in the Isle of Man.

Karen Horncastle was the design + project architect whilst at Ashley Pettit Architects.

Winner of the 2012 Green Apple Gold Award (Local Authority) and
+ Overall winner (Built environment + Architectural heritage).

Design + drawings © Ashley Pettit Architects

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

An 'ideas' scheme incorporating some simple strategic moves to reduce energy use and to provide an excellent working environment for a speculative office building: high thermal mass; natural ventilation; night cooling; maximising daylighting levels, in a package that would significantly raise design standards for this sector in the Isle of Man.

Feasibility study • 2012

This scheme revitalised the garden of a well established house in a Douglas conservation area.

The curtilage of decrepit hard landscaping was removed and replaced by a planted wall, a new kitchen terrace and a new driveway.

Replacing the old car port with a new double garage, carefully detailed as a response to the house, created a new protected rear garden play area.

Completed 2011

Photographs © Patricia A Tutt

The idea that a Museum collection would be introduced through a Cabinet of Curiosities is one to light the fires of imagination, for the designer and, more importantly, for the Visitor. In this age of dependance on virtual interaction, that the visitor will be greeted by such a density of objects will be refreshing and exciting.

The space proposed for this unbuilt project is modest and this suggested  an opportunity to immerse the visitor in the collection. Rather than  a single cabinet placed in the space, the visitor would enter the cabinet, filling the entire room, clearly rooted in the tradition of the 'Wunderkammer'.

The height of the space would accommodate a new upper floor and a staircase of display boxes. This division, reducing the scale of the space, would bring the visitor into close contact with the objects held in the cabinet.

The view from the Museum shop is of a set of boxes arranged to form a map of the museum. Each would hold an object or information related to the display of that gallery, thereby embedding the museum within the cabinet.

Two openings at the upper level would be made to allow the Giant Deer to be viewed from above, claiming the Deer as a part of the Cabinet's contents.

A speculative scheme for two blocks of terraced houses.  These houses front onto a main road with garages and car parking to the rear, this is good quality developer housing, open plan with good outside spaces offering something distinct in the local housing market.

A project in the Laxey conservation area to rationalise and extend the existing property for a young family.

The scheme retains the existing 2 storey section of the house, demolishing a single-storey section, rebuilding as 2 storeys.

The new family space is open and flexible and develops connections to the garden and the wooded slope behind.

Completed June 2013

Internal photographs © Patricia A Tutt

A large residential plot between Ballasalla and Castletown, this application proposes the demolition of the house and outbuildings and redevelopment as a modest residential scheme.

The outline application is illustrated with a range of types of dwellings, demonstrating how planning policy could be met in each case.  A naturally well screened site, the proposal incorporates a signifiant amount of open space.  Although the site has a long established residential use it remained un-zoned in the Southern Area Plan. 

The application for outline planning approval was granted at appeal.

The site has subsequently been sold to a local developer and construction of their proposals commenced in early 2024.

A proposed refurbishment and upgrade for a Douglas terraced house which would see the ground floor dividing walls removed, rear windows extended to form doors to improve access and connections to the outside space to the rear and a plywood lining including storage shelves, cupboards, a fold away desk, kitchen appliances and storage and a new staircase.

Reorienting the staircase would allow a fixed stair access to the loft above which could, in turn, accommodate a new home-office.

Unbuilt project 2015