A bespoke Paragraph 80 private residence in Northumberland with a design concept derived from numerous bell pits discovered as part of all our overall site analysis studies.

Bell pits were historically used to excavate minerals from below ground, which involved digging a vertical shaft downwards and expanding the bottom outwards in a circular shape, which in cross section resembles the shape of a bell.

Our intervention represents an additional bell pit (circular in plan) which has been partly uncovered by peeling back the earth to the southern and eastern parts of the site.

The green roof encapsulates the structure stepping down in an organic form to provide minimal visual impact to the North, east and west elevations responding to the surrounding context whilst also symbolising potential erosion of the bell pit over time.