Testimonials

We have done two projects together, one in London and one in Devon. We wouldn’t have thought of using anyone else. Fiona is very good at being on top of planners and builders. She operates brilliantly in a man’s world. She’s clean and minimal but also sympathetic to the architecture. She has a very diplomatic way of steering you in the right direction if she disagrees with you. Rosemary Yallop, client

Fiona was recommended by a friend and we clicked with her straight away. She understood us, that we were building a ‘home’ and not a ‘project’. She can read what you want to do and lead you in a very intelligent way. She is very persuasive in a good way. Extremely empathetic, creative, professional and easygoing, a special person who has become a friend to us.’ Macarena Wheldon, client

Fiona has a calmness, maturity and warmth combined with a steely discipline that makes here a rock in stormy seas and someone with whom one could not better weather such a project.

Her creation of space will, dare I say it, go down in the annals of contemporary British domestic architecture. Tim Plaut, client

A design of genuine quality and vision. John Pawson, Architect, Padstow

Exemplary model for new development in environmentally sensitive areas. Deyan Sudjic, Director of the Design Museum, Padstow

One of the more beautiful things I’ve ever seen. Alain de Botton, Author and broadcaster,
Rowden

McLean is an architect who thinks of everything. Dinah Hall, House & Garden

As would be expected with a project of this specification, the detailing is immaculate throughout, and the materials exquisite; cherry joinery and flooring, a zebra-like marble master-bathroom, and high performance glazed screens. Even the trees were carefully specified to provide clear views from the kitchen through a grid of trunks and dappled shading to the drawing room above.

While many people envy expensive homes and some designers may deride and dismiss their architectural merits, it should be remembered that money does not buy taste, restraint or refinement. It is all too easy to be vulgar where money is no object. Wise investment comes through good design, and in this case McLean Quinlan have produced another exemplary London home.’ Rob Gregory, The Architectural Review, Holland Park

The cohesiveness of the scheme has been achieved by establishing firm design principles from the outset in order to achieve clean surface: light fittings are recessed, ironmongery minimised, storage integrated. Services are routed through fattened walls on either side of deep window reveals at the front of the house, and in the wall between the front and rear rooms; heating is underfloor, apart from two unprofiled slab wall radiators in the kitchen. ‘You’ve got the bare bones of traditional architecture in view and very little soft furnishing, and that helps blend the two,’ says McLean Deborah Singmaster, Architectural Journal, Ladbroke Grove

For architect Fiona McLean, the notion of luxury is not synonymous with a lavish budget: “My work is not concerned with creating grandiose schemes, but with producing well-designed living spaces without compromise.” She does so without fail. Those lucky enough to commission her, find the inner structure of their homes whipped away and remodelled to maximise space and light, the look is modern yet elegant. Liz Elliot, House & Garden