Innehållsförteckning för Issue 148 October 2022 från Houses

1 Carport2 Laundry3 Living4 Terrace5 Kitchen6 Dining7 Library/bedroom8 Robe9 Bedroom10 Balcony11 Void12 Attic Located in the inner Brisbane suburb of Spring Hill, Green House is the third project designed by Brian Steendyk to occupy the same section of narrow street – and the second of them that Brian designed for himself. Comprising renovations of traditional Queensland houses, this collection of neighbouring designs reveals the consistency of ideas in Brian’s practice over more than twenty years, including a genuine concern for preserving the suburb’s particular character as one of Brisbane’s oldest residential areas. But Green House also presents a departure: building on the lessons of earlier projects, Brian approached the new house with more willingness – and confidence – to explore bolder, more expressive architecture. As a result, this modestly scaled…

1 Entry2 Hall3 Music/craft4 Garage5 Stair6 Laundry7 Pantry8 Kitchen9 Rumpus10 Bedroom11 Deck12 Living13 Dining14 Study15 Service yard Captivated by the natural beauty of Blackburn’s Bellbird area – a classified National Trust bushland just 16 kilometres east of Melbourne – homeowners Nicole and Cameron sought a contextual, single-level home that resonated with its surroundings. The project brief called for a warm, comfortable and sunlit home with spaces to come together as a family and to retreat to in solitude. Bower Architecture and Interiors’ rigorous briefing process focused on how the clients wanted the home to feel, driving an empathic design approach to support the family’s daily lives. “Nicole and Cameron had no preconceptions about how the house should look, but [they] were steadfast in their desire to honour the landscape,” says…

1 Bedroom 2 Laundry 3 Living 4 Courtyard 5 Kitchen/dining 6 Attic The streets of Paddington in Sydney are lined with Victorian-era homes adorned with ornamental iron lacework and decorative classical details. But it’s often impossible to tell what lies behind each heritage facade. Originally dark and disconnected from their surroundings, many of these houses have been altered and opened up for contemporary living. A case in point is Paddington House by Trias. Beyond the charming facade lies a beautifully crafted family home, designed to maximize the impact of passive heating and cooling. The contemporary design references the character of the terrace and its neighbourhood, while creating a calm, light and airy interior with flexible and functional spaces that suit a young family. With an adjoining terrace, the challenge is…

1 Deck 2 Entry 3 Rumpus 4 Bedroom 5 Hallway 6 Stair 7 Kitchen 8 Dining 9 Living 10 Study Everyone has some sort of ritual after returning from the beach. For many, this ritual often involves dusting off sand and taking a quick rinse under the shower to wash off the dried salt from the ocean as we transition out of the elements to refuge. Hollywood, a sensitively updated beach house at Smiths Beach on Phillip Island, honours the unique rituals of each visitor and builds on thirty years of well-loved patterns of living by the coast. The original house was designed in the early 80s by John Baird, a prominent architect in Melbourne at the time. Baird’s ethos was grounded in resourcefulness and energy efficiency. His designs had…

The story goes that Curzio Malaparte, standing with a visitor before his house, looked about the vertiginous rocky cliffs fortifying the island of Capri against the Tyrrhenian Sea and explained that the house, Casa Malaparte, was already here; his role was simply to design the scenery. I can’t help thinking about this surreal inversion while sitting at the table, eating chocolate cake, with the owner and architects of Seagrass House, perched on the rocky incline of a north-facing gully in perfect isolation at the southern end of Tathra Beach. Of course, back in 1942, Malaparte was being rambunctiously provocative in his usual style. Fast-forward 80 years, and our cultural production is now located firmly in the Anthropocene. It has become self-evident that our greatest collective challenge is to steward our…

The small country town of Yackandandah in north-east Victoria is located at the confluence of two creeks. The area’s Traditional Custodians were dispossessed by European settlement, which was spurred during the mid-nineteenth century by a gold rush, and the town’s population quickly swelled to a high of 3,000 in 1862 (today, the population is around 2,000). This brief surge left a built legacy of weatherboard shopfronts that remain today, lining the main street and anchored by a pub at each end, the whole nestled into a valley surrounded by picturesque hills. Chris Gilbert, a founding director of architecture practice Archier, grew up in Yack (as it’s known by the locals). As a child, he often rode his bike over the rise that now contains Court House: a sloping site, located…

Artist Penleigh Boyd is suggested to have done his best work painting plein-air on the banks of the Birrarung/Yarra River, in the bushy outer Melbourne suburb of Warrandyte. His son, architect Robin Boyd, spent his earliest years here, scrambling around the garden of a picturesque cottage his father had designed and built near the river before he tragically passed away in a car accident when Robin was four years old. Warrandyte would have an enduring hold on Robin Boyd; over the course of his life, he designed and built at least seven houses in the area (excluding Small Homes Service projects), all of which were for artists. Many of the early houses followed a “Warrandyte idiom” characterized by rough-sawn timber and locally sourced stone. Following a disastrous bushfire that swept…

The phrase “less is more” was first used by Robert Browning in his poem Andrea del Sarto in 1855, but it rose to prominence in the middle of the twentieth century when it was associated with the minimalist movement in art, literature, music and architecture, becoming particularly synonymous with the work of modernist architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Architect Paul Owen’s design for a super-efficient home in Brisbane’s inner suburbs brings a whole new meaning to “less is more.” What if less house gave you more life? Fewer hours spent commuting means more time with family. A smaller home requires less garden maintenance and has fewer surfaces to clean, leaving you with more energy to pursue the activities you enjoy in life. The owners of Spring Hill House, Ryan…

01 Hopper picnic table Belgian designer Dirk Wynants has given the traditional picnic table more leg space. Hopper has slanted legs and tabletop edges – a clear reference to the hop poles characteristic of the Westhoek region. The tabletop doubles as a backrest when the user turns around. livingedge.com.au 02 Follow Me outdoor light Follow Me, designed by Inma Bermúdez for Marset, is a portable and rechargeable lamp series featuring timber handles, a durable shade and a three-position dimmer. Practical and beautiful, it can provide up to 20 hours of light per charge. robertplumb.com.au 03 Joe outdoor sofa This signature sofa range has been reimagined in an outdoor design that’s made to last with quick-dry foam scatter cushions, water-repellent fabric and a 50+ UPF rating. Comfort is essential for indoor…

1 Entry2 Garage3 Passage4 Bedroom5 Water tank6 Outdoor tub7 Drying court 8 Pantry9 Kitchen10 Dining11 Living12 Terrace13 Bar andplanter On a forested edge of the Margaret River townsite, a large block was cleared for development. Interest from prospective buyers wavered due to the perceived smallness of the resulting strata lots, but local designer Ash Stucken of Studio Stooks saw potential in an outlook usually reserved for more expensive and expansive bush blocks. Ash and his partner Miranda Geiger purchased a site and set about designing a home that would best capture the essence of its location. The finished result is Karri Loam, a skilfully orchestrated sequence of intimate spaces that intensifies everyday experiences and encourages loose occupation. Miranda describes their desire to design the house as a retreat, and…

When I attended a Christmas party at my mother’s then recently completed house in 2012, I walked in with few expectations, the last of which was that a chance meeting would lead to the beginning of my independent career as an architect. When I met Lindie and Kerry, who later became the clients of our Southern Highlands House, it quickly dawned on me that I had worked on the design of their vineyard weekender as a student at Beverley Garlick Architects some 15 years earlier. Propelled by a few wines and my youthful enthusiasm for architecture, I soon launched into a description of some of the minute details of their house, which I seem to recall rolled into a passionate monologue about the merits of good design. This performance was…

In March, two years of ongoing research around retrofitting existing housing stock to better suit more diverse needs was presented in the exhibition RetroFit Kit: Design Tools for Making our Homes Accessible. At a 1:1 scale, a showroom-like installation demonstrated how Melbourne’s housing could be modified and the implications for the millions of Australians whose living needs are not currently being met. Housing disadvantage comes in many forms and its solutions are often complex, with dwelling design rarely considered. But this exhibition and the body of research behind it elevate the power of design, deep architectural knowledge and small changes. Retrofitting is a critical strategy for architecture in addressing the mismatch between the diversity of our society and the relative homogeneity of our housing stock. Led by associate professor Maryam…