The Sunken House at 75a De Beauvoir Road, is a house in De Beauvoir Town, in the London Borough of Hackney. It was built in 2007 to designs by David Adjaye. [1] [2] It was built for the photographer Ed Reeve. [1]
The house is clad in stained black cedar. [1] The site for the house was excavated to the level of a basement. [1]
The website of David Adjaye Associates writes that the house "both extends and polarises the usual pattern" of the surrounding semi-detached Victorian villas, with a private courtyard below the house and its panoramic views. [2] The bedrooms of the house are on the first floor with a large studio on the second floor. [2] The full height of the house cannot be seen from the street, and it is not overlooked by its neighbours. [2] The design of the house mirrors nearby workshop buildings and matches the size of the Victorian villas that adjoin it. [2]
On April Fools' Day 2015 Reeve submitted a planning application for a private railway station for Crossrail 2 which would be built directly underneath the house. [3] Reeve and his family would access the trains by the means of travellators that would accelerate to the speed of the passing trains to enable them to board without disruption. [3]
