On a beautiful site just outside Cambridge our clients had bought an old farmhouse was in such a severe state of disrepair that it had to be demolished. Plans were drawn up for a replacement house, which the planners decided should look like an old barn with black timber cladding and a red tiled roof. We decided to treat this as an opportunity rather than a restriction. Being a New Build, it never was a barn, so rather than mimic the details of the local farm buildings, we have updated and reinterpreted them into a new rural vernacular.