Cleeve Howe
Cleeve Howe is a house that must have one of the best views in England. The building was originally a Victorian hunting lodge, set above Windermere village with views across Lake Windermere to the Langdales and beyond. The house is set within the Windermere Conservation area and has landscaped gardens designed by the famous garden designer Thomas Mawson.
Built Works have overseen an extensive refurbishment of the house to modernise key spaces and make the most of the prominent location. We don’t want to reduce our role to nothing, but essentially bedrooms, bathrooms, living room, kitchen, pantry, all now have the same view of Windermere and the mountains to the north.
The main part of the house has been refurbished and extended, with particular attention given to reinstating historic features such as the moulded plaster ceilings and stone window frames. A new open plan kitchen connects the lounge through to a new timber framed extension that provides uninterrupted views of the garden, lake and fells. The less grand, and historic servants quarters, part of the house has planning permission to be extended and reconfigured to open up the cramped rooms to create an open plan hallway that connects the kitchen to the dining room, bringing in natural light and providing views from the whole of the ground floor. The huge roof spaces have been extended into to provide additional bedrooms.
Originally a large cast iron greenhouse sat at the centre of the garden, which had fallen into ruin long before the clients moved to the house. The original parapet walls and tiled floors remained. A new lightweight aluminium greenhouse has been erected on the original site.