In an English village, this woody passivhaus makes a tiny carbon footprint

For a list price of £2,100,000, this contemporary Oxfordshire barn comes with too many assets to properly list on this page. There’s the prestige architecture by Tom Gresford of Gresford Architects, faced in western red cedar and endowed with oversized picture windows. The passivhaus design means the home generates its own heat and ventilation. And the lush, private setting makes it feel of another time.

Working with an existing 1960s bungalow, Gresford rearranged the original interior into a series of painted wood ‘boxes’ that now form the core of the house. Then he configured living spaces that flow freely around the central hub. The main lounge, office and kitchen are separated by pocket doors and the dining area and sitting room open onto the gardens with sliding glass doors. Porcelain floors by Mosa and timber boards by Dinesen run throughout the main floor up to the deep veranda.

An upper storey with three bedrooms brings the total living space to 3,200 sqft. The main bedroom, with an en suite, overlooks a northwest swath of the property and a powder-coated corrugated-steel roof is fitted with skylights to bring natural daylight into the bedrooms. But the home’s most compelling feature is its textural wood siding, harvested from 14 western red cedars that grew on the site and machined at the onset of the project.

Known as Old Orchard, the house is smart-wired — lighting, music and blinds are controlled by a customisable KNX-based building management system. And the eco credentials make the site incredibly efficient. These include 22 solar panels, a 16 kWh battery, triple-glazed Ecovia windows, an air-to-water pump and softener, and a mechanical ventilation and heat recovery system with a built-in duct heater.

The gardens were professionally landscaped with a kitchen garden, greenhouse and an orchard of plum and apple trees. Lawns bordered by mature hedging extend beyond the double garage, sheds and summerhouse. It’s hard to imagine the village of Littleworth is just outside.