MOST VICTORIAN and Edwardian houses of any size had attics, usually reached by rickety, winding stairs and intended for the use of servants. Even quite modest homes often had a little attic room for a live-in maid to crawl into for a brief sleep.
First used purely for storage, attics began to be turned into rooms in the mid-18th century, when lath and plaster partitions and ceilings were added. As they were used by servants, apprentices and skivvies, they were inferior to the main rooms in the house. Otherwise known as garrets or rookeries, these rooms under the eaves were considered cheap, substandard accommodation for those too poor to afford a proper room.
After the First World War, with the advent of a more democratic attitude to housing and the demise of live-in servants, attic rooms disappeared for a time. The concept will not go away, however. We continue to have a fondness for attics, so much so that in recent years homeowners have been trying to re-create them with expensive and extensive loft conversions.
Now a few enterprising developers are doing away with the need for loft conversions by reintroducing the attic. This time round, though, for perhaps the first time in the history of domestic architecture, the attic is being built to the same high standard as the rest of the house.
The link with the past has been given a contemporary twist: the 21st-century attic is a “bonus room” reached by a secret staircase behind a door, so that once you shut the door you are completely private and on your own. And although these secret rooms are a kind of sixth bedroom, they are not marketed as such.
Cala Homes, which is keen on the idea of bringing back the attic room, is building an estate of six such homes in Boundary Park, on the site of the former Oatlands Cricket Club in Weybridge, Surrey. They are upmarket homes, given that prices start at £1.2 million, and are situated in a gated development.
The homes are very big, very modern, and do not immediately look like houses with old-fashioned attics. It all started by accident, says Philip Brown, the company’s marketing manager. “About five years ago we were building some new homes in nearby Sunningdale with very large roof spaces, and realised that here was a lot of wasted space that could be put to good use.
“So we decided to make an attic, with proper stairs rather than a pull-down loft ladder. At first these rooms were intended purely for storage, but then we thought that it would be a good idea to turn them into genuine rooms that would give a comfortable space within the house.”
The next step, says Brown, was to add en suite bathrooms and wardrobes, so that the bonus rooms could be used by a nanny, granny, teenager or guest.
The rooms are enormous, on average 25ft by 20ft, and have the same thick beige carpets, Villeroy & Boch and Philippe Starck fittings as the rest of the house. In fact, the attic idea is proving so popular that with its next project Cala is including a kitchenette in the attic so that the bonus rooms really will be self-contained and can even be offered to a lodger or a paying guest.
At the moment, the idea of the pre-converted attic seems confined to expensive new developments. The Irish developer Copperfields has a select development of 22 five-bedroom detached homes with secret attics in Rushbrooke Grove, Co Cork. The sales agent, Gary McGahon, of Hamilton Osborne King, says: “It is a very good idea, and buyers love it. But at the moment most developers are staying away because of the high cost of pre-converting the attic. We only have this one new development with such a facility, and these houses are large, with 2,400 square feet, and expensive for Ireland at €580,000 (£396,000) each.”
Up in the attic, you can also go to town with the decor and keep the rest of the house restrained. The attic room I viewed in the Cala development was done out in striking red, white and black, and there was even a colour co-ordinated cricket bat against the bed as a reminder of the sporting history of the location.
Attic rooms may have evolved by happy accident but they are proving a great selling point, says Laura Millbourn, of the selling agent, Jackson-Stops & Staff. “These bonus rooms are proving to be the most coveted in the house, and as they have en suite facilities they can fulfil many uses.
“This modern take on the traditional attic is only going to grow as buyers realise just how versatile they can be. Viewers get a wonderful surprise when they come to look round, and we predict that before long everybody will want a house with a ready attic. The biggest problem with so many modern homes is always space and storage, and with a pre-converted attic you have it without having to add on or build an expensive loft conversion.”
It is one of those really good ideas that other developers, and not just those at the top end of the market, should consider copying. After all, the modern attic is a far cry from the cold and draughty servants’ quarters of Gosford Park.
Boundary Park, Weybridge: 01932 259945.
Copperfields: contact Hamilton Osborne King on 00353 21 427 1371
