A blaze that destroyed the family home of an award-winning architect was caused by a “third party”, investigators have said.

Clive Chapman, 55, said forensic teams concluded the blaze on Eel Pie island started on a footpath between his five-bedroom house and his workshop.

He said: “The private investigators working on behalf of the insurance company have finished their investigation and concluded it was a third party, whatever that means. We don’t know any more than that.

“We haven’t heard any more from the police, we don’t know whether they are going to pick it up again.

“The fire was started outside the house, that much we do know.

“I take that to mean it was either kids or something more onerous.

“It could have been kids messing about, but it wasn’t caused by some electrical fault in the workshop or the house or something like that.”

He added: “We are not necessarily suspicious at this stage – it is still being looked into.”

Police investigation is still continuing and officers are speaking to witnesses.

Mr Chapman – an architect for the Twickenham Riverside project – spent 25 years building the house, completing it in 2007, and hopes to start work restoring it in January next year.

The father-of-two said a neighbour who was living abroad had allowed him and his family to stay at her home.

Islanders have also brought them meals every night, and St Mary’s Church parishioners have been washing their clothes and returning them to their doorstep.

Mr Chapman thanked the community for its “tremendous support” following the blaze on September 12.

He said: “The people have been fantastic helping us out.

“We’ve had 10 or 15 volunteers on Saturday and Sunday working to clear up, which was amazing.

“We’ve got skips coming and we are clearing the site pretty fast and are going to scaffold over the whole building to make it water tight so it will dry out and we can assess the damage.

“Engineers have been in to see it and 30 per cent of the brickwork has got to be replaced, but the rest looks like we can keep.”

Call for fire safety meeting

Eel Pie islanders have asked the fire brigade for a meeting to discuss safety precautions after a huge blaze burned down a family home.

Residents were forced to flee across the island’s only footbridge to the mainland, as flames ripped through the house.

Dan van der Vat, of the Eel Pie Island Association (EPIA), said there was no formal evacuation procedure.

He said: “The nightmare would be a fire that prevented some people from getting to the bridge, in which case what do we do?”

The residents’ association agreed to set up an action group to organise safety measures.

The EPIA has asked the 120 islanders to keep their own fire extinguishers, store gas bottles and cylinders carefully, safely dispose of rubbish, watch out for intruders and not light bonfires or fireworks on the island.

Mr van der Vat said: “It’s ironic really that we are particularly vulnerable to fire although we are surrounded by water.”