Setting up home in a greenhouse sounds like one of the hottest, most uncomfortable experiences imaginable – not to mention one that would seem to afford little privacy. Kevin Dash begs to differ. The Australian-born architect, whose projects include Number 1 Knightsbridge, a residential block behind the Lanesborough hotel in west London, and the Bank Audi headquarters in Beirut, has transformed a series of Victorian glasshouses near Chichester, in West Sussex, into a beautifully tranquil family home, now on the market for £3.5m.

Dash, 67, and his English girlfriend, Angela Watson, 63, bought the derelict glasshouses, in the grounds of Woodend House, in 1982. At the time, they owned a boat, moored at nearby Hayling Island, but were looking for a weekend property to retreat to when the weather turned foul. Dash had helped the estate’s owner to transform various outhouses on her land into residential property, and the glasshouses caught his eye. “I wanted a wacky weekender,” he explains. “The whole idea of living in a glasshouse was absurd, but it appealed because it extended the possibility of outside living.”

The couple paid £125,000 – a substantial sum at the time – for the 100ft-long greenhouse wall, the ruined glasshouses and a jumble of potting sheds to the rear, then set out to transform them into a comfortable home. In the first phase, which Dash project-managed from a distance, he restored the south-facing glasshouses (still used as ferneries today) and the two conservatories at either end of the wall. In the middle, he created an orangery-style summer sitting room. Built of recycled timber and metal from the original glasshouses, the room looks as though it has been there for ever.

Dash then demolished the potting sheds and built a kitchen/utility room, dining room, winter sitting room, two bedrooms and a bathroom on the north side of the original wall. These are connected by a glass walkway that runs along behind. So far, so good – phase one won a local architectural award – but Dash was keen to have closer control of the project. He gave up his job at a successful architectural practice in London in the mid1990s, set up on his own and embarked on phase two of Woodend, as the house had become known.

He applied for planning permission to add a T-shaped guest extension, consisting of two bedrooms, an office and a bathroom, connected to the main building by a glass atrium, to be used for enter-taining.The proposal immediately ran into trouble: residents of some of the other converted outbuildings on the estate were concerned that the new wing would encroach onto what had been the orchard to the north of the house – and Dash’s application was rejected. He won on appeal, however, and, like the first phase of the house, the resulting construction blends almost seamlessly into the surrounding landscape.

Entering the house from what is effectively the back, it is difficult to appreciate quite how large it is – nearly 13,000 sq ft of living space. The understated entrance lies through a courtyard box-hedge garden, with an overhead canopy of twisted crab-apple trees that throws patterns of light and shade. Inside, the long walkway stretches ahead, white and cool; yet the light filtering through from above makes it seem as if you are still outside. And you can see through the house to the surrounding landscape – an open stretch of untended paddock to the north and, to the south, the landscaped but not prissy grounds (about 55 acres), which include an arched avenue of wis-teria, blocks of yew hedges, mown paths and two serene ponds. The scene is dominated by a huge copper beech in the centre of the lawn in front of the house.

Everywhere, the line between outside and inside is blurred. One moment you’re walking through a fernery planted with Australian palms, with muscat grapes dangling from the ceiling (they tried making wine out of them once, but it came out closer to vinegar), the next you’re in a huge living room with french windows that lead straight out again. The profusion of light, the neutral shades on the walls, the natural-wood joinery and the stone floors add to the outdoors-indoors feel.

The hazy distinction between the two extends beyond the main house. At the bottom of the garden, next to a large square lily pond, is a wooden building that started life as a potting shed, but has become a fully working kitchen with a sun deck for barbecues – the couple held a Mexican fiesta there a few years ago.

The project, Dash says, has been an experiment, with the house as his “laboratory”, evolving over the years with the addition of a peaceful outside sitting area here and a tennis court there. Even catastrophes have encouraged innovations. The 1987 hurricane cleared a wooded area in front of the house, which became the garden.

Dash originally intended the interior of the house to be pure white plaster, but after a builder spilt his cup of tea down one wall, he asked a friend who restores frescoes to finish the walls using velatura, a traditional wax finish from the Veneto area of northeast Italy that gives a mottled effect.

Dash has taken what he has learnt from the house into other projects. The building he designed in Beirut has a scaled-up version of the long central corridor; and, having been closely involved with local artisans on the restoration of Woodend, he says he now works almost exclusively in places where he can do the same thing.

“It has been a real architectural education for me,” he says. “The wonderful thing was working with the place.” Indeed, it is only the desire to spend more time with family in Australia that has led the couple to sell.

So, what about the temperature? Doesn’t it get uncomfortably hot, even during a British summer? Dash, who hails from Sydney, says the house “started to move the climate in the direction of what I was used to” – but not to the point where it would be uncomfortable. The 57 french windows allow air to flow through the rooms in summer, while the glare blinds that line the roof of the glass kitchen and bedroom conservatory extensions keep the heat of the sun at bay. All that glass, meanwhile, allows the couple to live partly outside, even during the colder months. “What is wonderful about the whole glass thing is how it extends the seasons,” Dash says. “The house really comes into its own in the spring and the autumn.”

— Jackson-Stops & Staff; 01243 786316, www.jackson-stops.co.uk

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