The Bunker

Location: 

South Creake

Site Area: 

Project Completion:  

Sector:  

Expertise:  

3,552 sqm

Planning

Residential

Architecture, Conservation, Sustainability

Project Information:

The Bunker; a project established to repair the existing former Royal Observation Corps Monitoring Post and develop 5 holiday lets as contemporary reimaginings of ROC Orlit “B” observation posts.

To ensure its future as a heritage and educational asset through the generation of revenue from new holiday accommodation on the site, these structures are contemporaries of the Monitoring Post and similarly can be found across the UK’s coastal areas where they formed part of Britain’s post-war air defence strategy. By utilizing materials of pre-cast concrete elements, manufactured off-site, the buildings are raised above the landscape on slender concrete legs to reduce the impact on the site’s ecology and also affords occupants extensive views over the boundary hedges northwards towards the sea.

Each unit includes a large, glazed sliding door to maximise these views, but is positioned to avoid inter-looking with its neighbours. Access is via metal stairways to mimic the original Orlits’ access ladders. The site is intended to be self-sufficient in generating its own power and treating its own waste water on site. A wind turbine and reed bed will be located towards the rear of the site, behind the holiday lets, furthest from the public road and close to the existing trees. Once complete, the site will offer improved biodiversity with meadow flower seeded across the site, new hedgerows studded with trees along the boundaries and the proposed reed bed.