Swamp thing

Kunal Trehan and Thomas Hope are creating the home of their dreams in Sandbach, and started with the very damp grounds

- Kate Houghton

The first thing guests arriving at Kunal and Thomas’s new home will see is an intriguing glimpse of ancient treetops, set against a wide-open sky, behind a set of ultra-modern gates, tying the age of the land and the newness of the home together in perfect harmony. As you will have come to understand by now, if you have been following their story in Cheshire Life over the last few months, absolutely nothing is left to chance with this build and creating a sense of arrival was high on the to-do list when Kunal and Thomas started their project.

“To create the impact we sought the driveway was designed with bespoke black aluminium privacy gates connected to stone pillars,” Kunal says. “We loved the idea of mixing the traditional and modern, which has been extended to the architecture of our build. Once the gates gradually open you are greeted with tall, slimline limestone gabion-walling mixed with composite anthracite panels and then, to add even more glamour, we have lined the 70-metre driveway with Italian cypress trees on both sides, leading to a Mediterranean-inspired front garden. Lighting is key of course, so the home-automation design has allowed for a stunning lighting scheme to bring the area to life after dusk.”