Cover Feature 29
The Decades
We Lost Our Cool
We gained a glittering white box of a fridge when the larder went out of fashion,
but did part of our soul suffer in the cold air? William Knight looks at the generation
lost to the larder, and its possible fi ght back from obscurity
BEFORE
refrigeration, at the start of a trend when he specifi ed
foodstuffs were a larder in his self-build house. “We used
stored in a small room attached to the a lot of reclaimed materials both inside
north wall. A miniature window covered and out. In the larder, for example, we
in fl y mesh provided ventilation, and used marble and slate shelves, we had
a stone fl oor combined with marble some granite fl ags for the fl oor, and we
shelves maintained a cool, year-round tiled the walls with white tiles in a very
temperature. It was the larder. traditional, classic sort of way.”
Yet the walk-in cool-room, or larder, The larder door is of traditional plank
became defunct with the advent of with a thumb latch, and a bull-nose glass
widespread refrigeration, and was almost spyhole. It’s also on a north-facing wall.
forgotten completely when post-war “That’s quite important,” he says, adding
builders fi rst changed the larder into a that it has double zinc screens, to prevent
cupboard and then neglected to build fl ying insects and other pests from gaining
one at all. But has the larder merely been access through the ventilation opening.
waiting for a revolution in sustainable Allan is critical of our lost art
thinking for it to, once again, become the of storing food. “A lot of things
premier food-storage facility? automatically go into a fridge – for
“There is defi nitely a resurgence,” says example, cheese and eggs, even jam and
Alan Crawford, architect and founder tomato ketchup. You certainly don’t want
of the Crawford Partnership, and he to keep good cheese in the fridge. It
attributes the larder’s rebirth to changes in wants to be kept cool, but it doesn’t want
the way we live. “Kitchens are becoming to be kept at the temperature a fridge will
more minimalist, beginning to preclude keep it at. You will destroy the fl avour if
having things like vegetables, cheese and you make it too cold,” he explains.
fruit, even, in the fridge. It’s all about This is a common theme among
changing lifestyle habits,” he says. larder lovers. Tim Hayward, writing in the
In nearly every scheme on the books Guardian, notes that “traditional English
the client wants a purpose-built utility food developed when the only fridge was
space, and the larder is “part and parcel a well-aired larder, a meat safe or maybe
with the utility room,” he explains. a marble shelf in the pantry. Surely you
“We are looking at a lot of know that a fi ne cheese is a living thing
Victorian houses with a – chill it and you might as well throw it
scullery at the back of into the wormery.”
the house – quite often
with a larder attached. LOST GENERATION
Many refurbishments Allan is disappointed that recent-builds
are to do with opening have no larder, and talks about his
up the back of the house, grandmother’s 1960s house complete
rationalising what was the with its large ventilated cupboard, and
scullery, larder and outside loo he doesn’t see why this should not be a
and making it all into one big standard feature, once again. “Instead of
space – creating an open-plan having the gigantic open-plan kitchens
hub of the house, connecting that you often see now, you could just
to the garden, with a separate tack on a two-by-two or three-by-two
utility/larder/store space.” area to be a larder and you’ve got a very,
Keith Allan, journalist and very useful room.”
owner of Berwick-based, Woodside This is defi nitely a trend that Aidan
Reclamation, was not aware he was Mortimer from “no ordinary” building ➔
Larder.indd 29 22/7/08 09:45:16
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