From house to home: Addison Crescent

Open the enormous antique armoire filled with fur coats, step inside, and you’ll find a hatch through to another world; a slide into a version of Narnia – only one with a ball pool lit with multicoloured ceiling lights. The garden treehouse of this six-bedroomed detached house on Addison Crescent, in London’s leafy Holland Park, is the den of all our childhood imaginations made real.

If you can bear to leave the playhouse in the garden to the kids, a marble-floored entrance hall greets you as you enter the main house, the stonework continuing for the full sweep of the stairs to the very top of the property. The walls of the bathrooms are backlit onyx, while a full length skylight over the swimming pool appears to let daylight to pour into the space – on closer examination it reveals itself as a sophisticated LED mimicking the effect.

These are just a few of the standout design features of the meticulous renovation of this handsome west London property. Remodelled in its entirety, the house was designed by Wolff Architects to be rebuilt backwards from the façade, specifically to cater for ebullient family life. The lower ground floor features a dog shower (factored into the design with the present owner’s seven dogs in mind) and the swimming pool is complemented by a sauna, steam room, gym and changing facilities.

Elegantly furnished throughout, the interiors were designed by Studio Gabrielle, a multidisciplinary design studio with a reputation for its sophisticated approach; the basement bar, for example, is made striking by an Art Deco style bronze sunrise adorning the back wall. Lit with vertical narrow beams which cut across its ridges, it pulls the focus onto any choice bottles that line the bar’s ‘horizon’. “The finishing quality of this house is so much better than anything else available on the market at the moment,” says Knight Frank Partner Jessica Bishop. “Where other nearby properties were last renovated three or five years ago, this is newly completed.”

The crescent itself is popular for its quietness and its close proximity to Kensington, with the Design Museum and Leighton House both only a short walk away. The street acts almost as a bridge between the equally desirable (but busier) addresses of Holland Villas Road and Addison Road. The area is popular with those who have some public profile: Music mogul Simon Cowell is a neighbour and Queen guitarist Brian May owns three houses nearby. Residents benefit from a patrol car offering 24-hour security.

While the treehouse offers a doorway into a fantasy life for children, the house itself is very much a real opportunity. “You can walk in with your suitcase and it’s all there waiting for you,” says Bishop. “It’s a proper family home, and it’s very special.”

Addison Crescent has a guide price of £37,000,000.