West London building reborn as home and casting studio

A run-down two-storey building on a corner plot in west London now works as both a home and a casting studio. Architecture practice Fieldwork led the conversion, adding a new top floor and a side extension to make a 245-square-metre, three-storey building, according to Dezeen. The ground floor holds the studio, where actors audition on camera, with a two-storey apartment and roof terrace above.

The expansion lifted the building's internal floor area by more than 60 per cent. Fieldwork added a mansard roof, a steep-sided roof that creates usable space inside, and a double-height side infill, a tall extension that fills a gap beside the existing building. That side piece sits where a covered garage used to stand.

Both new additions are clad in zinc shingles, small overlapping metal tiles that wrap the roof and side wall in the same skin. The effect keeps the old brick base distinct from the new upper parts. The practice calls the scheme Studio House, according to Fieldwork.

Inside, the plan is organised around a new central staircase. The first floor contains a bedroom, living room, kitchen area and bathroom, while the second floor contains a further bedroom and ensuite. Light reaches the middle of the plan through multiple skylights cut into the mansard roof, including one directly above the staircase.

The material palette stays pale and plain. Bathrooms use microcement, a thin cement coating that forms a smooth, joint-free surface. Elsewhere, light oak joinery is combined with Douglas fir linings, giving walls and built-in cupboards a warm timber finish.

The ground-floor casting room is built for clean sound and picture. Its walls and ceiling carry additional acoustic insulation, material added to block noise passing in and out. The floor is cork to control reverberation, the lingering echo that can blur dialogue on a taped audition.

Upstairs, the skylights are circular. Their shape was drawn from the round softbox lights, the large diffused lamps used to light faces evenly, in the casting studio below.

What makes this stand out is that loop between work and home. The tools of the audition room set the shape of the daylight overhead. Photography for the project was by Peter Landers.