Master of Disguise

A subtle mimicking of the surrounding hills has allowed this Angus home to become part of the landscape.

- Caroline Ednie

Taking its cue – and hue – directly from the Angus landscape, Zinc House fits perfectly into its surroundings. In fact, it has an almost chameleon-like presence on the brow of the hill on which it sits, overlooking the rolling hills towards St Andrews and the sea beyond. On a cloudy day it appears as a battleship grey, yet against blue skies it seems almost green in colour. And on a rainy day the house and its surrounding sandstone courtyard walls gradually turn the same colour.

None of this happened by chance, as architect Graeme Hutton explains: “The stone in the area has this lovely mossy-green tone. We liked it so much we originally thought of using it to clad the house, topped with a zinc roof. But the more we experimented with the local sandstone the more we realised that it had limitations as a building material. The site is very exposed and the sandstone would have quickly eroded in the wind and frost.

“But one day when I was thinking about the project, I had an idea. I texted the clients, saying, ‘Let’s do the whole thing in zinc, with just the boundary walls and courtyard in sandstone.’ They gave the go-ahead right away,” he says.