6 minute read
Hamptons meets Richmond Architect, Reinhard Weiss.
Interview with Reinhard Weiss from 3S Archtects
Please tell us a little about the background of 3S Architects?
3s architects was founded as a partnership in 2000 by a German and an American architect with the core idea to add creative modern designs to character and period properties. 3s Architects is now a limited company headed by founding director Reinhard Weiss with a team of experienced architects specialising in private residential projects. With our international background and former experience from leading London and international practices, we are bringing new ideas and technologies to every project. We believe, private properties deserve as much attention to detail as commercial and civic projects. We aim to add value through sound conceptual and technical design to build high quality and long lasting homes which will stand the test of time.
Over the last 20 years we have realised hundreds of projects – renovations, extensions and new builds - and we continue to contribute to our local community as well as building projects across the UK and international locations.
What is your definition of a great architect?
A good architect is a professional, who listens to their clients to interpret their brief, and through his or her architectural experience prepares designs to an advanced level, overseeing a project from concept through to completion. Throughout a project and on site, the architect represents the client, and they should be competent in all aspects of the design and building process, and accomplished at communicating with a multitude of consultants, manufacturers and tradesmen/ builders to prepare and coordinate the designs. They will be good leaders with strong vision who can convince everyone involved which direction the design and project should leadthroughout the process. As an individual, they have exceptional design skills and an aptitude for lateral thinking with a strong design style and ethos. They are optimists and enablers, able to provide direction to the client to achieve the best designs possible. They are flexible enough to adapt to situations as they arise without being thrown off course from what it is that will give the project and architecture integrity.Much of the process in architecture is a team effort - great architecture is born out of great team work, good clients, consultants and good contractors with the architect taking the lead.
What words of encouragement would you give to a potential client who is considering making that first call to you?
Extending your house or building a new home can be a daunting task, but with a good professional team, creative designs and the correct preparation nearly anything is possible. Designing and building your dream home is a journey full of challenges, but it can be an exciting and rewarding process. Choosing an experienced architect with a good track record, as your trusted partner, makes the building process for the client as enjoyable as possible.
What major changes have you seen during your time practising in London in terms of clients demands and design trends?
The underlying demand to bring more light into period properties connected with the desire for more habitable spaces; to improve the connection, traditional houses have with their gardens and landscape; extending at basement level with cinema rooms and gyms; reconfiguring internal spaces to improve the flow with open plan arrangements, embracing modern designs and interiors by introducing innovative products and materials as well as advanced technologies. And recently the addition of garden pavilions as home offices or recreational spaces.
Tell us about a residential project you are most proud of?
Most of our projects have something unique – with inspiration drawn from the physical context or an intimate relationship between the inside and outside and connection to a garden landscape. It is difficult to choose any single project as the one we are most proud of, but there are a number that stand out. Some of our best residential design projects are when we are able to transform a mundane or unlock a badly laid out house to create an inspiring and light filled home which has a positive identity and character. Redesigning the inside and out, reinstating historical character where needed and contrasting this with simple well-crafted modern designs can bring a timeless clean elegance.
Perhaps one of our favourites was the redesign of a family home in Kew for the former owner of the Rock Garden Café, a restaurant and venue which attracted famous bands for gigs in the 80s. The client was great fun bringing a lot of their personality to the project. They deliberately bought the ugliest house on the street because they knew they could do almost anything they wanted to it. When we first saw the house it was very poorly laid out, with multiple changes in level across the ground floor and a stair located within the centre which was dark and an obstacle. We redesigned & extended the house from top to bottom, added a new basement, extensions, replaced the original stair with a modern open tread stair with a glass façade overlooking the rear garden and opened the space up to improve the flow of the house with great connection to the garden. Others include the refurbishment and extension of a property on Sheen Road, owned once by one of three daughters of a local property developer, with its cantilevered glass extension hovering above the rear garden. Amongst our most exciting projects currently under construction are a new villa on the Greek island of Lefkada which nestles semi-buried into a steeply sloping site overlooking the sea and a modern copper clad house in the rural village of Dummer.
Your favourite aspect of life in South West London?
SW London has all the elements for a good life – boasting the largest green open spaces in London including Hampton Court, Bushy Park, Wimbledon Common, Richmond Park, and the meadows around the river Thames; its strategic position with easy access to London as well as the countryside of Thames Valley and its benefit from the great mix of people and cultures London has to offer, which brings with it fresh views and a willingness to explore new ideas expressing itself in their architecture and design.
3s architects
17A Princes Rd, Richmond TW10 6DQ
Tel. 020 8332 9966
