Beach House

Beach House is a film about a unique example of rural modernism built on the UK coast of Suffolk by the architect John Penn. As well as being an architect, Penn was a painter, musician and poet. Beach House is one of nine houses Penn built across East Suffolk, each of which features designs of uncompromising symmetry, adhering to the points of the compass in their positioning in the landscape. Using a limited language of materials and form, they were influenced by the time Penn spent working in California with Richard Neutra, and might be regarded as Californian modernist pavilions in the Suffolk landscape.

Beach House is John Penn’s most uncompromising design. The film combines an archive film made by Penn himself on completion of the house with experimental sound recordings made during the same period and material recently filmed in the house to explore a convergence of filmic and architectural language. Together, the material invites the viewer to piece together Beach House in its past and present forms.

Producer/Director/Camera: Emily Richardson
Sound recordings: John Penn
Thanks to the John Penn Estate, Bruce and Anne Page and Cedric Green Made with the generous support of The Arts & Humanities Research Council at the Royal College of Art, London.

Beach House is part of a trilogy of films collected in House Works: reFraming the Modern House.