ECE was approached by Wiston Estate in 2017 to comprehensively redevelop the site at North Farm in West Sussex, with the primary aim of realising the estate’s strategic plan to create an exemplar enterprise site within the South Downs National Park.
The scheme comprises expanded wine production and storage facilities alongside new visitor attractions. A new restaurant with private dining room has been created though sensitive restoration of two redundant agricultural barns. The demolition of an existing dilapidated storage buildings has allowed the recreation of the historic courtyard at the heart of the site.
Alongside this, a new build element houses facilities for wine production, a visitor shop, a wine tour route, and a stunning tasting room, promoting tourism to the South Downs National Park. Extensions and alterations to the winery buildings provided additional production capacity, taking the annual average from 125,000 to 250,000 bottles of wine.
Through consultation with the South Downs National Park, the landscape led approach focused on enhancing the historic farmstead. The landscaping consisted primarily of hard surfacing with pockets of soft landscaping and planters.
From the outset a sustainable approach had been adopted towards the design, construction, and operation of the new Winery. An energy hierarchy of Lean, Clean and Green was followed to reduce operational energy use and carbon emissions, with passive design prioritised.
The retention and reuse of existing buildings reduced the developments embodied carbon, with air source heat pumps installed for both the historic and new buildings and electric car charging points provided. ECE also specified locally sourced materials where practicable, which included the oak cladding and flint which were sourced from the Estate.
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