All the loveliest house exteriors from the archive
When looking for a house, the exterior has as much of an effect as what's inside. It can tell you about the bones and history of a house, but moreover, you have to see if every time you come home and it can make a world of difference. We've gathered the most lustworthy house exteriors from the House & Garden archive for your perusal, whether something similar is a dream or a reality.
Simon Brown1/28The location and exterior of this Sussex farmhouse were enough to persuade Paolo Moschino and Philip Vergeylen to buy it on the spot. After only moments of peering through the gate of this West Sussex farmhouse, Paolo and Philip decided to buy it. When the estate agent arrived, he was incredulous: 'What?' he said, 'without seeing inside?' 'But we knew straight away that this was what we had been looking for,' says Philip. The charming facade and house are half-Tudor and half-nineteenth-century.
Lucas Allen2/28'The building was originally a 17th-century farmhouse with a grand front added in the 18th century, so there is lovely Georgian symmetry at the front,' says Rose Uniacke of this London house. The grand, symmetrical façade - an 18th-century addition to the original 17th-century farmhouse - is reflected in the lake it overlooks.
Simon Brown3/28Interior designer Caroline Holdaway is the owner of this tiny 1710 farmer's dwelling situated in a hamlet running along the upper valley of the River Coln. Named Mullions, it is a one-up, one-down cottage to look at from the front, with an extension hidden at the back to bring more space and light.
Urban Electric4/28The cottage was built around the late 1800s, and sits amongst the woodland of North Carolina. It is classically American in style, with a wraparound porch and white clapboard exterior.
Kasia Gatkowska5/28Situated by a tree-lined freshwater canal in Harlingen, Holland, this three-storey listed building dates from 1720. It belongs to Rients Bruinsma, an architect. The brick exterior and large windows are traditional and have an understated elegance.
Andrew Montgomery6/28Nearly twenty years ago, art dealer, writer and broadcaster Philip Mould and his wife, Catherine, bought Duck End, a small seventeenth-century manor house in Oxfordshire which. The proud house has a wonderful symmetry and is a brilliant example of this architectural style.
7/28Arne Maynard | House Exteriors
Allt-y-bela, an ochre-walled, late-medieval farmhouse, is the Welsh house of gardnener Arne Maynard. The colour, layout and features of the house's exterior are unusual but very beautiful and fit in the landscape perfectly.
Michael Sinclair8/28Sat in the Oxfordshire countryside, this rustic farmhouse exterior hides the modern, eco-friendly renovations inside. The long building is made from honey-coloured stone and the window frames have been painted a light blue.
Ngoc Minh Ngo9/28When interior designer Harriet Anstruther took possession of her run-down Sussex farmhouse, she put her eclectic mark on it while keeping its original features. The wonky, flint-clad, timber-framed house is utterly charming, with its catslide roof and stamp-size windows.
10/28Inchyra House is a beautiful Regency mansion overlooking the Ochil Hills outside Perth. It has an imposing façade and has been described as 'the most perfect small estate in Scotland' by Country Life.
Jan Baldwin11/28No rural English garden is complete without a garden path. The stone walkway leading to Gipsy House, the home of the late Roald Dahl, was laid by the author himself. He was assisted in his efforts by a gentle giant of a local builder, Wally Saunders, who provided the inspiration for one of Dahl's most popular novels, The BFG.
Paul Massey12/28Wanting a place to display her treasured collection, Emma Burns, senior decorator at Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler, transformed a converted barn at her country home into a sitting room and guest cottage full of hidden surprises and witty details. From the outside, the barn looks much as it always did, with its beautifully weathered stonework and roof tiles: the one change is that the original doors have been re-made as shutters.
Lucas Allen13/28It is an understatement to describe Mount Algidus, a 53,000-acre cattle station on New Zealand's South Island, as isolated. It occupies the high country between two great rivers and the Southern Alps. Flower beds of lavender and incredibly neat lawns contrast beautifully with the wild outdoor surroundings. The front door of the house is painted light blue, as are the window frames.
Alexander James14/28After moving from London to Wiltshire, Ed and Polly Nicholson bought this commanding house, with a tall Georgian façade rising into view, four-square and handsome. The exterior of their house is preceded by a river and woodland.
Alexander James15/28This double-fronted Georgian townhouse in Ludlow is one of 500 listed buildings in the town. The back of the house overlooks a garden that is formal in design with a central canal, clipped hedges and a wide terrace in front of the drawing-room windows.
Simon Upton16/28This historic eighteenth-century house was careful restored to highlight the gardens that open out to the surrounding woods, streams and coast beyond. The house was 'turned around' in the 1870s, with the north front refaced as the main entrance and the south front, pictured here, becoming the back of the house.
Simon Brown17/28Built in 1770, Robin Muir's cottage has a new glass extension by Cantifix. 'From the beginning, I had an image of a glass structure linking the old and the new, but was not sure how to make it work. We wanted the new extension not to be a pastiche, but to feel lived in and respectful of the older part of the building,' said designer Caroline Holdaway.
18/28This Hampshire vicarage with its Dutch-gabled brick facade probably dates back to the seventeenth century. The garden stretches from the side of the house, towards the church to which it once belonged.
Rachael Smith19/28Complete with a picket fence and climbing roses, this house gives the feeling of being in a country village despite being in West London.
20/28Eighteenth-century House in Virginia | Exteriors
Anne Massie's home in Viriginia was built as a small plantation house, perhaps as early as 1758, with later additions in the American Federal style. The exterior is in classic white clapboard - the section to the left, including a lower ground floor is an addition made in 2011 in the same style.
21/28Exterior House Interiors Design Ideas| Exteriors
At Slackwood Farm in Lancashire, the owners are keen birdwatchers. Architect Paul Archer was aware of this and so designed a spiralling glazed garden room with panoramic views. Vitra's 'Grand Repos' chairs and footstools furnish the interior, while a glass circle covers an old well.
Simon Brown22/28Sussex Farm South-Facing Exterior | Exterior
The south-facing rear of architect Ptolemy Dean's modern rustic farmhouse is connected on the left side to a former byre.
Paul Massey23/28This pretty eighteenth-century village house in rural Burgundy belongs to antique-textiles dealer Susan Deliss and her husband Max. The house - as beautiful as it is tranquil - backs onto the Serein river.
24/28At this farmhouse in Andalucia, Spain, the sitting room leads out to an azure-blue-painted loggia. It is surrounded on three sides by a shallow pool, with plants in terracotta pots arranged along the edges.
Paul Massey25/28Erik De Maeijer designed the concept for the garden at the Nyetimber estate; the lake is original, and reflects the manor and surrounding outbuildings in its mirror-flat surface. The house is on the far left, with the White Barn in the middle and the Medieval Barn on the right.
Christopher Simon Sykes26/28Set in the green landscape of the Scottish Borders, this new house was built over the foundations of a derelict cottage four years ago. The property belongs to artist Sue Phipps who has filled the space with interesting objets and curiosities.
Michael Sinclair27/28The exterior of Flint House was designed to echo the geology and landscape of the area. It consists of a main house and an annex, sitting 50 metres apart.
Lucas Allen28/28New York Home Exterior | House Exteriors
Made up of two adjacent brick buildings, the charming house is situated in Greenwich Village. The single door on the left is for everyday use, while the double doors on the right are used for more formal occasions.
When two architects bought one of the [link url=https://www.houseandgarden.co.uk/gallery/architects-small-classic-new-york-home"]smallest houses in New York[/link], they transformed the interior, creating a bijou interior with a sense of spaciousness that belies its exterior appearance.
