Little Cottage, a bold modern beach house above Praa Sands on the UK's south coast, has come onto the market for the first time since it was completed. Designed by architect Alex Michaelis as his own family retreat, the property offers space, light and uninterrupted views across the English Channel and the Atlantic beyond.
The house sits at the end of the garden, with the sandy beach just steps away. Despite its name, Little Cottage is no ersatz rural dwelling. Its 2,422 sq ft of accommodation is contained within a sculptural white box that owes more to Le Corbusian modernism and noughties minimalism than conventional seaside architecture.
The coastal facade is an exercise in asymmetric reductivist design. The ground floor holds a 50ft-long living room and kitchen, with central sliding glass doors that open out onto the lawn. On the west side, the principal bedroom suite sits behind a private sitting room, while the east wing houses the entrance and hallway, with a cylindrical stair tower lit by a circular skylight.
Upstairs, three en-suite bedrooms all have views across the water. Curved walls create a sculptural upper level, with access to a balcony at one end of the bedroom corridor. Detailing is minimal throughout, with white walls, floors and ceilings paired with frameless glazing to bring in as much light as possible. The material palette includes French-plastered walls, limestone, Corian worktops in the kitchen, mosaic-clad bathrooms and wide cedar floorboards.
The ground floor also hosts a cloakroom and utility room, along with a wet room with direct outside access and special provision for drying and storing wetsuits. Two of the three upstairs bedrooms occupy the curved ends of the first floor, all with freestanding baths, while the bedrooms have Juliet balconies.
In addition to the separate Shack, which could double as a studio space, the property has a pair of sheds or surf stores, parking spaces and rights to a mooring at nearby Porthleven Harbour. Michaelis, who founded Michaelis Boyd with Tim Boyd in 1996, has created a rare piece of uncompromising contemporary seaside architecture that is as aesthetically rigorous as it is warm, inviting and functional.
Little Cottage is for sale through Lillicrap Chilcott for £2.5m. Tel: +44 1872 273473, LillicrapChillcot.com
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