High-end houses

Rose Martin looks at a new book illustrating architecture in high places.

The title may seem a bit odd — Modern Mountain — but it does what it says on the tin, Dominic Bradbury’s book offers lush images of 25 contemporary houses concentrated in elevated and beautiful locations throughout the world. A great reference for those about to build a house, an extension, or for those with an interest in architecture, Bradbury has a great eye for design and unique forms

The author, who writes on architecture for the London Times and pops up regularly in the high-end glossies, has a contact book to kill for — and offers a visually delectable and very broad range of house from high-end practitioners throughout the world, but mostly in Europe, America and Australia.

And the title forms a loose container into which he throws what some would call, ‘cabins’ and other would consider palaces, but the overall test is superb design in beautiful, high retreats. Ranging from relaxed holiday homes in snow and sun, or full time residences in outstanding locations — the architecture is chosen for the manner in which the structures respond tot their environments — the spaces reflecting the space outside.

Dividing into ‘Cabin’, ‘Chalet’ and ‘Villa’, that simple breakdown doesn’t really do justice to a handy-sized book that free-ranges across a lot of styles and continents. And there’s something here for everyone — from the puritanical architect with a love of near-empty volumes — to quirky, wooden huts, monastic but staggeringly expensive retreats and near-as-dammit copies of the Barcelona Pavilion.

There are 25 houses here from heavy-hitting and famous names — starchitects like Ai Wei Wei and the master of the tinny shack, Glenn Murcutt — and all are one-offs in high, airy and healthy locations.

Colbost House in the Isle of Skye will to chime with an innate, Irish understanding of the vernacular — and it’s a stunning unaccompanied song of simple rectangles in black larch set against a wild and tussocky landscape. Designed by Dualchas Architects, the firm is based on the island and has designed over 30 houses there. Mary Arnold-Foster has created a collection of distinct buildings for her clients, in line with the outhouses of local farmsteads, a principal followed to good effect in Ireland too. The Skye house, built as a holiday home for long-standing visitors, uses larch cladding stained in olive black with black, corrugated sheeting on a simple A-frame roof, cut through with roof lights.

Two-story in one building and single story in the other, the volumes merge to create a clean and efficient open plan house whose beauty is in the framing of sea and land views and in the simplicity of its finishes and materials. Anyone intent on building on a sensitive site should take a look at this modest, island beauty.

All of the houses in Bradbury’s book have a grace and a design philosophy of their own and there’s a huge pick and mix here for the design and house lovers — and it gets better with every flick because the eye begins to absorb all the minor details of internal layouts, as much as the graphic, clear external images by photographer, Richard Powers.

Bradbury’s prose isn’t going to be parsed by hungry house-hunters and that’s just as well — he’s not the greatest stylist — but he has an architectural eye and his choices are superb and wide-ranging. Plus, the book is a really handy size, nice and square and not as heavy as these references usually are — and the good news is that it costs just twenty quid sterling — around 25 euro — which isn’t bad for a book of this quality.

A great present for the wannabe architect in your family, for the general reader with an interest in design, interior and exterior, for the house-lover, the self-builder, (great ideas to flex your interiors here) the planner too, even. Put this alongside Dermot Bannon’s latest and you’re onto a winner for the a great double-whammy Christmas present.

Mountain Modern: Contemporary homes in high places by Dominic Bradbury.

Photographs by Richard Powers

Thames & Hudson, £19.95 hardback 450 illustrations.