It is difficult to categorize the architect Eliza Manola. With studies at the Faculté d’architecture de l’ULB in Brussels and a great love for the Athenian modernism of pioneering architects such as Valsamakis and Zenetos, Eliza returned to Athens in 2000 and became known for the two hotels she designed, the Orloff Resort in Spetses and the Ammos Hotel in Crete. He continued a successful career with renovation projects in the center of Athens, residences in Anavyssos and Kifisia as well as projects in Sifnos, Lefkada and Spetses, where he was involved in both the design of newly built homes and the renovation of imposing mansions.
Eliza is known for her inventive ergonomic design that avoids trendy chatter, her idiosyncratic sense of materials and colors, as well as her holistic approach to every project. He is one of the few architects who deals himself, almost obsessively, with all aspects of a study, reaching down to the design of furniture, textiles and lighting.
“Our plan was to bring light and energy to the interior spaces through the use of contemporary materials and colors, while respecting the original layout and character of the house.”
He left Athens in 2016, when he felt he had come full circle. She settled in England with her husband and daughter and almost suddenly fell in love with the old country houses of the British countryside. He started buying them and refurbishing them, giving them a second life.
Respecting their historical architecture, the particularity of their styles and details, Eliza proposes her own contemporary design. She installs in these listed buildings an aesthetic free from clichés that combines Flemish minimalism (a holdover from her studies) with a Mediterranean exuberance of materials, patterns and colors. Her latest work, The Priory, is her most challenging to date – perhaps because it is also the house she eventually decided to live in with her family.
The Priory is in the Surrey town of Godalming, in an iconic location on Church Street, a 17th-century high street lined with art galleries, antique shops and pubs – a setting so picturesque it appeared in ‘The Holiday’, a comedy starring Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. The Priory, a long, Grade II listed red brick house, originally built around 1650, served as a residence, pub and doctor’s office, before eventually being split into two properties.
The house has two distinct sides: the front, which faces the street, and at the back the rooms, which face an internal south-facing garden, facing a lake. “Our plan was to bring light and energy to the interior spaces through the use of contemporary materials and colours, while respecting the original layout and character of the house,” explains Eliza. “We wanted to keep the English country style, but in a dialogue of ‘creative contrast’, with bold colours, earthy materials, Scandinavian and Italian furniture.”
The unexpected yellow door hints at the unusual for the hazy English countryside light and the flash of color that follows and runs through the house. A herringbone floor of polished yellow lava stone by Made a Mano in the entrance, while a magnificent staircase with a painted runner leads to the first floor. The kitchen, which was hidden at the back of the building, was moved to the heart of the house, close to the hum of the street. The green marble counters come from Tinos. Painted ceilings, geometric bathroom tiles, ceramics by Eleni Vernadakis, adjustable wall lights by Charlotte Perriand.
“This house was an opportunity to expand our knowledge of planning and refurbishing listed houses,” says Eliza, who worked with her construction specialist husband on the conversion of The Priory, where they have lived for a year time with their twelve-year-old daughter. “It’s more difficult for an architect to design his own house, but I’m happy that we finally managed to build a house in the English countryside with Greek joie de vivre!”
