In fact this is relatively low-key Outram, though in housing terms it is extravagant. He uses colour boldly, yet subtly. With its reds, greens, blues, yellows and glossy black, you might think the Egyptian House would be a riot of competing pigments. Not at all. If you go to the opposite bank of the river and gaze at it across the sodden fields of the Thames Valley, a curious thing happens: it recedes, begins to disappear. It is almost as if it were sporting a cunning form of camouflage. Its undulating roofline helps it to fit into the rounded contours of the area. To emphasise the point, nearby is a new block of flats on the river, done out in planner-friendly "monster cottage" style half-timbering, covered with white rendering, and with a big pitched roof. In the drawings, it probably looked totally innocuous compared to the Egyptian House. In actuality, it shrieks. You suddenly realise what a very assertive colour white can be, against the natural greens and browns - and occasionally blue skies - of rural England. But for all its slightly unexpectedly landscape-friendly qualities, the local planners showed real courage in supporting Outram's Egyptian House when it was so clearly out of the ordinary.

So what do we have? A paradox. A house that is utterly unique, yet responsive to its context. And which is, in its Egyptian way, classical. It is arranged symmetrically in an almost temple-like manner. There is a central hall which leads through to a central dining room (arranged with a rare original set of Charles Jencks Egyptian-inspired dining table and chairs). This looks straight down the formal garden, where sphinxes flank rectangular pools marking the course of a water cascade descending towards the Thames. Outram sees this stream as a symbolic Nile, with the boggy ground near the river as its delta.