Crawshaw Architects has designed the Stanbridge Mill Library in Dorset, United Kingdom.

This project is a new library fitted inside an outbuilding within the curtilage of Grade II listed Stanbridge Mill Farm in Dorset.

The main house is a beautifully converted Georgian farmhouse with a well-preserved water mill – while the library building was originally a cow shed but had been used for storage of farm machinery and garden maintenance equipment for over 40 years until the recent transformation.

The designers were asked to design an ambitious conversion that would transform this unloved out-building into somewhere fabulous that would attract frequent use and bring the previously narrow, poorly-lit farm building into service as a library and office, not least to house a private collection of books, including a section of historic books on Palladian architecture.

"While a decisive transformation of the interior was called for, we felt that the original use of the building needed to be part of the story," said Crawshaw Architects. "The high nave and pair of aisles are in the form of a classical library but are set out in the register of the original building using the materials and construction techniques of traditional farm carpentry and metal-work- making possible a degree of analogy between the old and the new uses."

This project has been shortlisted in the civic and cultural interiors category of Dezeen Awards 2022.

Designer: Crawshaw Architects

Project: Stanbridge Mill Library

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