The couple decided that the main building material for this project had to be brick, and they spent a long time searching for the perfect product. The Barkers sat in their old flat, surrounded by sample bricks and countless material samples ranging from shimmering yellow to dark, ochre-coloured clinker, until finally, the right one was found.

They opted for Wienerberger’s Marziale brick, a light, sandcoloured brick whose many hues and heterogeneous surfaces reference the character of the surrounding housing developments dating back to the reign of Queen Victoria.

The first impression of Forest Mews is that of many columns and pillars forming a kind of bar code that surrounds a triangular inner courtyard containing polygonal concrete slabs and criss-crossing strips of grass. The unusual geometry makes sense: for one, the high share of green ensures that the earth stores water during strong rainfalls and conveys it to subterranean cisterns, thus keeping the houses dry despite their topographical location under the street level. For another, the large expanses of grass between the slim façades of brick make the interior spaces light and airy, despite the rear courtyard location and the light coming in from only one side.

All three houses have two storeys and a narrow, long footprint. Each of the three units – one of them inhabited by the architects, the others rented out to a couple and a family – has its own outdoor space in the form of a small, intimate atrium. The main façade is covered in expanded metal mesh, on which the first plants are already climbing. In a few years, the plan goes, the brick components will be encased in green. When that happens, Forest Mews will have retreated even further behind its veil of fairy tale and modernity.