Australian Residential Architecture and Design
LIVING IN THE MOMENT
ISSUE 127
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Immersive spaces for retreat and reflection
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At a Glance
From the Editor Musings
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Contributors
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Fresh Finds Products
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His and Hers House: 46 Meet the Owners Working with an Architect The clients for FMD Architects’ His and Hers House share their experience of working with an architect. Bookshelf 50 Reading Collections of extraordinary houses, a new book on an iconic Sydney suburb and an exploration of the life and work of mid-century architect Bruce Rickard.
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MORA One to Watch
Jonathan West Studio
Lambert et Fils Studio
MORA’s recent projects respond to angophora treed bushland surrounds.
Playing with a variety of materials, Jonathan West designs furniture that doesn’t adhere to a singular style.
The bold utilitarian aesthetic of this Montreal-based lighting designer is founded on creativity and collaboration.
Home 54 Performance Choreography, theatre and audience participation combine to provoke discussion about contemporary notions of home. Dance yourself clean 83 Bathroom Products Marble mirrors, vividly coloured vanities and the latest in tapware to make bathtime a breeze. Home Futures 138 Postscript Predictions for the homes of today are re-examined through an international exhibition featuring drawings, photography and film.
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Panov Scott Architects In Profile
Zigzag Cabin by Drew Heath First House
Rosebery House by Andresen O'Gorman Revisited
The design philosophy of Panov Scott Architects is poetically expressed in considered architectural gestures.
Not deterred by a remote location, Drew Heath saw the potential for his first house to spur a string of future projects.
Expressed timber structure and enveloping timber battens shape spaces immersed in lush Queensland rainforest.
AT A GLANCE
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Be immersed in some of Australia's most captivating architecture through our coverage of homes that offer distinctive spaces for reflection and repose.
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Jacaranda House by SP Studio
30 Kia Ora by Baracco + Wright Architects
Alteration + addition Brisbane, Qld
Apartment Melbourne, Vic
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His and Hers House by FMD Architects
Camperdown Warehouse by Archer Office
Alteration + addition Melbourne, Vic
Warehouse renovation Sydney, NSW
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64 Stradbroke House by Gabriel and Elizabeth Poole Design Company with Tim Bennetton Architects
Cloud House by Akin Atelier New house Sydney, NSW
New house Stradbroke Island, Qld
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Lansdowne Crescent by Preston Lane Architects
Piz House by Barnacle Studio
Sly Brothers Semi by Archisoul Architects
Cove House by Justin Humphrey Architect
Alteration + addition Hobart, Tas
Alteration + addition Coledale, NSW
Alteration + addition Sydney, NSW
New house Gold Coast, Qld
CONTENTS
Musings
On my visit to Andresen O’Gorman’s Rosebery House (page 130) in Queensland, I was taken by the intensely immersive experience engendered by both the landscape and the architecture. This is a home that reminds you to live in the moment and enjoy a genuine connection to place. This Zen-like ambience isn’t limited to standalone houses in luscious rainforest settings. In Melbourne, an apartment renovation by Baracco and Wright Architects (page 30) has been instilled “with the comforts necessary to enjoy ‘the small pleasures in life.’” This design celebrates domestic rituals and coaxes us to relish the simple moments of daily life. With so much vying for our attention in this rapidly digitizing world, our need for a private sanctuary in which to recharge and reflect is becoming more and more integral to a balanced existence. Many of the beautiful homes in this issue encourage us to slow down and be present. A timely reminder for all of us!
01 Join us at an upcoming Our Houses event, where we bring architects and clients together to share the stories behind their houses. At our next session, hosted in Melbourne on 10 July, Timothy Hill, director of Partners Hill, will chat with his clients about the Longhouse, pictured here. With events scheduled for Sydney, Adelaide, Perth and Hobart – look out for an Our Houses in your city. Photograph: Shantanu Starick. designspeaks.com.au
02 Get lost in the labyrinthine spaces of 1000 Doors, an immersive installation by Christian Wagstaff and Keith Courtney. With a composition of thresholds that invokes a sense of familiarity, the corridors and rooms create a surreal domesticity through which visitors are invited to experience the emotive depths of their subconscious. Presented by Bendigo Art Gallery from 6 to 28 April 2019. bendigoregion.com.au
Katelin Butler, editorial director
03 Celebrate one hundred years since the birth of Robin Boyd, one of Australia’s most iconic architects, with a commemorative stamp from Australia Post. Produced in collaboration with the Robin Boyd Foundation, the new release stamps reflect the historical and continuing legacy of the architect and his influence on Australian design. auspost.com.au
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04 Keep an eye out for the 2019 Houses Awards shortlist, to be published online on Friday 12 April. Don’t forget to mark the details for the awards presentation night in your diary: Friday 26 July at Melbourne’s iconic Plaza Ballroom. Ticket sales commence later this month. housesawards.com.au
Write to us at houses@archmedia.com.au Subscribe at architecturemedia.com Find us @housesmagazine
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MUSINGS
Follow us for design inspiration.
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ARCHITECTURAL WINDOWS AND DOORS BY
Contributors Editorial director Katelin Butler Editorial enquiries Katelin Butler T: +61 3 8699 1000 houses@archmedia.com.au
Managing director Ian Close Publisher Sue Harris General manager, events & administration Jacinta Reedy
Associate editor Gemma Savio Assistant content editor Stephanie McGann Rachel Harris Writer Rachel Harris is a project architect at CO-AP Architects. She has been in practice for more than ten years and has experience working in both London and Sydney. Rachel also tutors at the University of Technology, Sydney where she advocates for sustainable design.
Andy Macpherson Photographer Andy Macpherson is an architectural and editorial photographer based in Kingscliff, Northern New South Wales. Andy believes that photography is the final document of an architect’s work. His love for people and architecture inspires beautiful, honest imagery.
Editorial team Cassie Hansen Josh Harris Alexa Kempton Mary Mann Production Simone Wall Design Metrik studiometrik.com General manager, sales & digital Eva Dixon Account managers Amy Banks Belinda Dobelsky Lana Golubinsky Victoria Hawthorne
Published by Architecture Media Pty Ltd ACN 008 626 686 Level 6, 163 Eastern Road South Melbourne Vic 3205 Australia T: +61 3 8699 1000 F: +61 3 9696 2617 publisher@archmedia.com.au architecturemedia.com New South Wales office Level 1, 3 Manning Street Potts Point NSW 2011 Australia T: +61 2 9380 7000 F: +61 2 9380 7600 Endorsed by The Australian Institute of Architects and the Design Institute of Australia.
Advertising enquiries All states advertising@ archmedia.com.au +61 3 8699 1000 WA only OKeeffe Media WA Licia Salomone +61 412 080 600
Kasia Werstak Photographer
Kirsty Volz Writer
Kasia Werstak is a Sydneybased photographer with an interest in the interaction of people and their environments. Her work spans interiors, architecture, landscape and portraiture.
Kirsty Volz is a founding director of design studio Toussaint and Volz. She is also a PhD candidate within the Architecture Theory Criticism History group at the University of Queensland.
Print management DAI Print Distribution Australia: Gordon & Gotch Australia (bookshops) and International: Eight Point Distribution
Cover: Jacaranda House by SP Studio. Photograph: Christopher Frederick Jones.
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CONTRIBUTORS
Member Circulations Audit Board
Subscriptions architecturemedia.com/store subscribe@archmedia.com.au or contact the publisher above ISSN 1440-3382
Copyright: HOUSESÂŽ is a registered trademark of Architecture Media Pty Ltd. All designs and plans in this publication are copyright and are the property of the architects and designers concerned.
Liason. by Sara Moroni
2019
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Shortlist announced online 12.04.19
Winners revealed at gala presentation in Melbourne 26.07.19
Award categories Australian House of the Year New House under 200 m2 New House over 200 m2 House Alteration and Addition under 200 m2 House Alteration and Addition over 200 m2 Apartment or Unit Garden or Landscape Sustainability House in a Heritage Context Emerging Architecture Practice
Jury Lindy Atkin John Choi Rachel Nolan Luigi Rosselli
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Bark Architects Chrofi Kennedy Nolan Luigi Rosselli Architects
Katelin Butler — Houses magazine
Prizes Australian House of the Year Category winners
$5,000 $1,000
Tickets and more information housesawards.com.au +61 3 8699 1000 housesawards@archmedia.com.au
SUPPORTERS
The pinnacle of residential design Celebrating Australia’s best
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Fresh finds
A selection of products from some of today's most exciting designers – including eye-catching lighting fixtures, unique vases and flexible storage solutions.
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Find more residential products: selector.com and productnews.com.au
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01 Lang Mursten bricks Lang Mursten is a range of extra-long-format, water-struck clay bricks, imported by PGH Bricks and Pavers from Denmark. Defined by its sleek, elongated form, the rustic yet contemporary range delivers an elevated aesthetic while accentuating the raw beauty of clay. pghbricks.com.au
03 Drunken Emerald capsule collection Articolo’s Drunken Emerald mouth-blown glass, first seen in the Float lighting collection, is now available in six new lighting designs. The glamourous hue is available in the Eclipse, Domi, Ball and Lumi wall sconces, as well as in the Trilogy pendant and Lumi table lamp. articololighting.com
02 Loop teak sofa Designed by Henrik Pedersen for Gloster, the Loop sofa is characterized by broad horizontal lines and assertive angles that combine to form a bold, comfortable profile. The sofa features a teak frame with a sling seat, strap back panels and cushions that can be used outdoors. coshliving.com.au
04 Plant vase collection An abstract play on a typical vessel, Tom Dixon’s Plant is a vase collection designed for both floral combinations and curated micro-ecosystems. Each vase in the collection is mouth-blown into an organic form with two stem-like openings. Two sizes are available. tomdixon.net
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PRODUCTS
05 Concetto surfaces collection Caesarstone’s Concetto collection sees slices of agate, quartz, amethyst and petrified wood hand-cut and bound to produce striking surfaces for the kitchen and bathroom. The semiprecious stone surfaces are heat and scratch resistant and easy to clean. caesarstone.com.au
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06 Bond shelving system Bond by Fogia is a flexible shelving system that balances style and function. It is designed to suit almost any space and can hang from the ceiling, nestle against a wall or stand on its own. Its simple construction means it can be put together by hand in a matter of seconds. fredinternational.com.au
08 Narcisse mirror Designed and manufactured in Melbourne, the Narcisse mirror by Anaca Studio has a minimalist, soft look defined by its sleek lines and contrasting materials. The warmth of the solid American oak frame complements the coolness of the mirror. anacastudio.com.au
07 Greenway Crackle lighting A Design Studio’s Greenway Crackle lighting collection draws on convict architect Francis Greenway’s design of Australia’s oldest lighthouse. The glass components are hand-blown into five shapes with a “crackle” finish that references the lighthouse's lantern room. adesignstudio.com.au
09 Hemera desk lamp New Volumes’ Hemera desk lamp, designed by Ross Gardam, was inspired by the brutalist architecture of the 1960s. Made from Elba marble, the striking desktop monolith features two solid circular volumes that intersect, with no overtly visible light source. rossgardam.com.au
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FRESH FINDS
10 Sydney dining chair Harbour’s Sydney dining chair combines an angular metal frame with handsome leather strapping. The chair is part of the wider Sydney collection, which includes a number of tables inspired by Australia’s harbour city. The chair is available in brass or stainless steel. harbouroutdoor.com
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11 Typography floor lamp Designed by Studio Truly Truly for Rakumba, the Typography floor lamp allows design enthusiasts to choose their own lighting composition. Seven different luminaires can be positioned anywhere along the central axis and can then be adjusted and dimmed individually. rakumba.com.au
13 R.I.G. modules R.I.G., or “Rudimentary Interior Geometry,” by MA/U Studio is a system of modules for the living room, kitchen, bathroom and wardrobe defined by minimalist expression. The sturdiness of the solid steel frame contrasts with the lightness of the shelves. boffi.com
12 Patio textiles Designed by Karina Nielsen Rios for Kvadrat, the Patio textile collection delivers vibrant colours for outdoor use, made of highly durable yarn. It features a fluorocarbon-free, environmentally-focused finish, which is water repellent, fast drying and soft to the touch. kvadrat.dk
14 Xi Plant Pot collection Bentu’s small and sculptural Xi Plant Pot collection accentuates the organic nature of plants with its angular form. The collection includes four sizes that complement each other when arranged together. Xi Plant Pot is made of new and recycled demolition concrete. remodern.com.au
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PRODUCTS
15 Built-in hooded barbecue Smeg’s sleek, all-stainless-steel hooded barbecue is built for performance and durability. The barbecue has five burners and a thermostat range between zero and four hundred degrees Celcius. Its hood is double insulated to ensure the exterior is safe to touch when in use. smeg.com.au
Wood has never looked so good Nothing comes close to the quality and consistency of Eveneer real timber veneer. Crafted from FSC certified wood, Eveneer is free from the variations and imperfections typically found in conventional timber veneers. The result is a finish that’s even in colour and pattern whilst still retaining the natural character and texture that only real timber can provide. ®
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JACARANDA HOUSE BY SP STUDIO
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Verdant terraced gardens and finely crafted joinery, stitch this reimagined Queenslander to its place and past to create a relaxed home and studio for the architect and his young family.
Words by Sheona Thomson Photography by Christopher Frederick Jones
This exciting reimagining of a 1920s weatherboard “porch-and-gable” house in Paddington marks the return of architect Scott Petherick, director of SP Studio, to Brisbane. With extended family residing there, it made sense that Scott would settle in Brisbane after a decade and a half spent working in Melbourne and abroad. When acquired by the Pethericks, the house had already undergone renovation, but the original layout and detailing were mostly intact. A deep, L-shaped verandah wrapped the home’s south-western corner, with living, dining, kitchen, bathroom and three bedrooms located upstairs and a workshop downstairs in the stump space, enclosed by typical subfloor battening. Prized among the existing trees on the site, in the northeastern corner of the sideways-sloping backyard, was a beautiful spreading jacaranda tree. Scott designed predominantly in section to get the levels to work; he remodelled the fall of the site into a raised lawn, to achieve simple family living on one level, with terraces down to another lawn along the northern boundary. Over the newly fashioned landscape, he imagined the sprawling jacaranda laying its purple carpet and casting dappled shade. The extent of new building on the main living level includes a generous family kitchen pavilion, connected to the rear, south-eastern corner of the existing house, and the reworking of a corner bedroom that has been expanded to become a parents’ retreat. Together, the pavilion and the “pushed out,” extended volume of the parents’ suite enfold a fireplace court, which aligns to the raised lawn and the interior living and dining spaces. Framed by the jacaranda, the view north stretches over the green swathe of rear gardens rising on the opposite side of the gully. Beyond the crisp edge of the raised lawn, the terraced gardens hold vegetables, herbs and flowers, convenient to the kitchen. Concrete steps
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JACARANDA HOUSE
4 Brisbane, Qld
Alteration + addition
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Family
mediate the connection to the lower lawn. Opening onto this quiet northern green are the new downstairs spaces – Scott’s architecture studio and office, an informal living area, a fourth bedroom and a combined bathroom/ laundry – which can be accessed directly from street level. The existing workshop space under the front of the house is unchanged. Here, Scott keeps a treasured heirloom of a wood lathe. It belonged to his grandfather, a fine woodworker whose handmade furniture and small artefacts Scott has tenderly incorporated into the dwelling. Materially and visually, Scott formulated a graphical order that celebrates distinctions between traditional and contemporary elements, while compositionally uniting the whole. Between upper and lower levels, the starched-white clarity of the main body of the house appears to float on the plinth-like, blackened and shady recesses below. The horizontality of weatherboard is given a counterpoint in the introduction of vertically battened walls and screens. White brick is introduced as a “stitching” material that honours thresholds between old and new spaces, inside to outside, and vertically anchors features such as the fireplace hearth. The kitchen pavilion is the prime element of the transformation. Scott has orchestrated a relaxed and refined sense of place that the family loves and inhabits with enthusiasm. The white brick threshold announces the feeling of a space that is more outdoors than indoors, like living on a patio with comforts inbuilt. While entirely contemporary in its language of concrete, steel, glass, and fine oak joinery, the pavilion follows the spirit of traditional construction in the elegant expression of connections and detail at all scales. It’s a deceptively simple, framed structure set upon a concrete slab that projects to hover over the raised lawn. Perfect in its “earthiness,” the concrete floor is honed to expose its fine aggregate. Ebony-finished stacking doors slide away into battened pockets to open the interior to the north and east. A little barbecue terrace, one-fifth of the pavilion’s area, whimsically hosts a rope swing, bringing a sense of play to the poised architectural expression. The skillion, with its battened, upward-sloping eve, looks up to the north, drawing in the jacaranda’s living colour as well as the dappled light and shade that the tree provides. The interior is elegantly furnished with bespoke joinery elements that do more than one thing, such as the countertop that steps down to a generous family table. This multitasking tactic is deployed in new joinery details, expressed as wraps and folds against the existing fabric of the house. Scott has also designed fine, freestanding pieces that join those his grandfather crafted. Most touching are the little “places” Scott has shaped into new surfaces, designed to hold small items that his grandfather made and to keep them close by, such as the small vessels that sit in his studio desk. Had the Pethericks stayed in Melbourne, Scott could predict their lifestyle in a typical terrace house. As interesting as living “at the back” of a terrace might be, the character and quality of traditional Brisbane housing suggested greater opportunity. “There’s a lot of playfulness in the old Queenslanders,” muses Scott. Exploiting this freedom, he has shaped a versatile response that engages Brisbane’s benign climate and offers a variety of spaces for his children to enjoy. The Jacaranda House is where his family will grow together, beneath the colourful blooms and in the embrace of a place designed to adapt to their changing needs.
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ALTERATION + ADDITION
3 Site Floor
711 m² 290m²
Design 6 m Build 11 m
Per m² $4,800
Products Roofing: Lysaght Klip-lok in Colorbond ‘Windspray’ External walls: James Hardie Linea weatherboard in Dulux ‘Whisper White’; Sculptform Shiplap cladding in Sikkens Cetol Ebony; Bowral Chillingham White brick Windows: Rosewood sliding windows in Sikkens Cetol Ebony finish from Allkind Joinery Doors: Rosewood sliding doors in Sikkens Cetol Ebony finish, American oak pivot doors in 2-pac finish and solid pivot doors in Dulux ‘Whisper White’ from Allkind Joinery Flooring: American oak tongue and groove flooring; Geostone Tilga exposed polished concrete Lighting: Rakumba Highline pendant from Cafe Culture and Insitu Kitchen: Carrara marble benchtop; Maximum Marmi Taxos benchtop and splashback from Artedomus; Electrolux gas cooktop, dishwasher, fridge, exhaust and oven; Oliveri Brushed Mito Square Gooseneck tap; Puri undermount sink Bathroom: Caroma Cube under-counter basin; Phoenix Gen X tap from Reece; Caroma showerhead; American oak joinery; Maximum Marmi Taxos vanity-top; Inax Yuki Border wall tile from Artedomus; Viridian mirror; Caroma Luna toilet External elements: Geostone Tilga exposed concrete; Bowral Chillingham White Brick; sandstone blocks from Brisbane Sandstone Other: Escea firebox and flu
01 A terraced garden, filled with vegetables, herbs and blooms, descends to the architecture studio on the lower floor of the house.
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02 White brick is used to underscore the new kitchen pavilion’s connection with the outdoors.
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03 The pavilion encourages relaxed family living on one level, poised to take in views over the gully.
JACARANDA HOUSE
Verandah Entry Bedroom Living Dining Kitchen Court Terrace garden Carport Workshop Store Studio Office
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04 The home’s cohesive material and visual order celebrates distinctions between traditional and contemporary design elements. 05 Elegant new joinery elements are expressed as wraps and folds against the original fabric of the weatherboard “porchand-gable� house.
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The kitchen pavilion is the prime element of the transformation. Scott has orchestrated a relaxed and refined sense of place that the family loves and inhabits with enthusiasm. 28
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Sections 1:400 06 A filigree eve tapers upward to the north and, together with the jacaranda, casts a gentle, everchanging pattern of light and shade.
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Architect SP Studio +61 4 2159 8718 scott.petherick@spstudio.com.au spstudio.com.au
ALTERATION + ADDITION
Project team: Scott Petherick Builder: Rycon Constructions Engineer: Westera Partners
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KIA ORA BY B A R AC C O + WRIGHT ARCHITECTS
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International Style modernism tempered by a youthful Italianate spirit instils a Melbourne apartment with a new layer of architecture that nimbly resists periodization. Words by Gemma Savio Photography by Rory Gardiner
In 1994 British architects Alison and Peter Smithson published a series of annotated drawings titled Small Pleasures of Life in their book Changing the Art of Inhabitation. The sketchbook excerpt depicts ten vignettes illustrating how delight can be nurtured through design. The experiences outlined in the notes appear modest and uncomplicated: “to work or write at a creeper bordered window,” “to see the sunlight spread across the floor” or to simply enjoy a view to “vegetation/the trees.” However, the prior deliberation involved in enabling these commonplace experiences is revealed by the drawings, which portray a specific architectural gesture behind each instance of domestic bliss. This collection of sketches forms an uncanny portrait of life at Kia Ora, a bijou apartment in Melbourne that was recently revived by Baracco and Wright Architects. In response to the existing Art Deco interior, directors Louise Wright and Mauro Baracco with project architect Jonathan Ware, have cultivated a meticulously detailed overlay of furniture and finishes that shape the way the home is inhabited. A number of the architectural elements described in the Smithsons’ diagrams were already present in the existing apartment. A bright green view to foliage, for example, is framed by well-positioned windows in almost every room. The rest is the work of the architects, who have instilled the home with the comforts necessary to enjoy the “small pleasures of life”: “to have easy access to possessions without sensing their presence all the time,” “to sit comfortably and read or talk of an evening,” to feel “doubly enclosed” while bathing and to simply “stand and look out without glare.” The apartment is a striking departure from the familiar image of Australian homes as open,
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sundrenched and highly saturated. Instead, Louise and Mauro have composed an atmosphere of calm through sophisticated manipulation of light and material. Translucent glass shutters in the kitchen and bathroom transform the glare of summer sun into a gentle wash of light that softens the edges of objects and surfaces. In the lounge room and bedrooms, custom brushed-steel curtain rods carry layers of velvet drapery, as well as sheer linen that mitigates afternoon sun. These swathes of white fabric permit a verdant glow and leafy play of shadows into each room. A restrained materials palette limited to muted grey walls, deep-green floor coverings and cloudy Carrara marble enhances the mood. Describing the ambience, Louise remarks that “it’s kind of like being in an Edward Hopper painting”– an earlytwentieth-century artist whose canvases frequently depicted sparely decorated interiors awash with light. Despite the relatively small scale of the home, the new interior is replete with subtle aesthetic references. As is typical of work by Baracco and Wright Architects, Kia Ora embodies the functionality and precision of International Style modernism tempered by a youthful Italianate spirit. Inspired by time spent working in Venice and Milan, Louise and Mauro embrace the Italian tradition of architects also working in furniture and industrial design. At Kia Ora this manifests in a suite of bespoke furniture items that once again fulfil the Smithsons’ criteria for a life well lived. In the lounge room, sitting opposite a new stone hearth whose exaggerated proportion Louise explains is “a mechanism that registers the length of the room,” a curvaceous mint-green sofa is a place to sit comfortably at the end of the day. The sofa’s cantilevered backrest doubles as a writing desk or, better yet,
APARTMENT
01 A steel ladder and guide rail enable access to the full breadth of the cleverly designed kitchen joinery. Artwork: Sophie Gralton. 02 The proportions of the new marble hearth have been exaggerated to register the length of the living room.
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a convenient ledge on which to rest a glass of wine. In the bedroom, a custom bed and wall-hung side tables sit beneath three milky-white wall lights, providing all the comforts necessary for reading in bed. Architect-designed furnishings are continued in the kitchen, where a fine-edged dining-table-cumbench carved from Carrara marble is central in the space. The surrounding joinery provides the small pleasure of having “easy access to possessions without sensing their presence all the time.” Cleverly designed cabinetry conceals the stovetop and additional prep area, and a steel ladder and guide rail enable easy access to the full-height cupboards above. Louise, who is trained in interior design as well as architecture, explains that every added element “had the potential to overwhelm the room.” This includes their own additions, which they have treated as a series of insertions, articulated by chamfered edges and dimensions that leave a fine, shadowed breathing space between new elements and the original walls. This subtle technique is meticulously executed in the bathroom, where dove-grey wall tiles are packed out from the existing masonry, creating a second skin that “doubly encloses” the space. A bathing alcove, in keeping with the fashion of Art Deco bathrooms, further enhances this comforting sense of enclosure. Details such as this allow the existing built fabric and the new architecture to hang together seamlessly in a way that resists periodization; so much so that at times it can be difficult to discern which elements are contemporary additions. “There’s a tension when you’re working within a strong existing condition, but still adding a layer of architecture that’s in the tradition of your practice,” says Louise. “Anything new is designed to have a conversation with what’s there in a way that isn’t jarring.” At Kia Ora, this conversation takes place between architectural geometries. The rectilinear Art Deco detailing, present in the original architraves, skirting, cornices, doors and door handles, sits in contrast to new curved forms. The sweeping arc of the balcony has been rescaled to develop a motif that serves as a subtle signifier of each element that Baracco and Wright Architects has layered throughout – a mechanism that makes the found condition legible. The pleasure that Louise and Mauro take in their work is expressed in this rigorous yet playful interior. In so thoughtfully facilitating the most intimate expressions of domesticity – bathing, sleeping, eating and the safe storage of treasured objects – Baracco and Wright Architects has made the Smithsons’ drawings tangible, culminating in a home that must truly be a pleasure to live in.
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1 Floor
90 m²
Design 6 m Build 6 m
Products Internal walls: Custom paint colour from Aalto Paint Windows: Viridian Décor Satin frameless glass panels Flooring: Dalsouple Dalrollo rubber flooring in ‘Blue Canard’; Tretford carpet in ‘Autumn Fern’ Lighting: Artemide Dioscuri wall lights Kitchen: Honed Carrara marble shelves and island benchtop; 2-pac joinery fronts in Dulux Traditional ‘Grey Green’ Bathroom: Agape Bucatini bathroom accessories, Dtile tiles in ‘Pigeon’ Other: Custom furnishings designed by architect
03 A pale green bedhead and robe provide ample space for keeping possessions tucked away from sight. 04 Chamfered edges and softened corners leave shadowed breathing space between the joinery “insertions” and the original walls. Artwork: Sophie Gralton. 05 A custom piece in the spare room transitions from a desk to a day bed, which can fold out to form a guest bed. 06 The bathroom’s dove-grey, curved tiling and Art Deco bathing alcove evoke a comforting sense of enclosure.
KIA ORA
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APARTMENT
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07 The architects’ contemporary additions hang seamlessly with the existing built fabric. 08 The arc of the Art Deco balcony informed a motif that recurs at different scales throughout the home.
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Architect Baracco and Wright Architects +61 3 9482 2077 office@baraccowright.com baraccowright.com
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Project team: Louise Wright, Mauro Baracco, Jonathan Ware Builder: Atma Builders Joiner: G. C. and B. S. Koumas Heating: Nissl Eichert Heating
KIA ORA
HIS & HERS HOUSE BY FMD ARCHITECTS
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Porch Entry Bedroom Lounge
5 Dining 6 Kitchen 7 Deck
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Sculpted around the simple daily enactment of the owners’ newly shared life, this addition to an inner-Melbourne terrace represents a binding together of stories, memories and moments.
Words by Hayley Curnow Photography by Peter Bennetts
Sitting among well preserved Victorian and Edwardian homes in the innerMelbourne pocket suburb of Clifton Hill, His and Hers House by FMD Architects is a celebration of connection and coming together. The clients, Pam and Arthur, had each engaged Fiona Dunin, director of FMD Architects, in the past; to design the celebrated Cross Stitch House (2013) for Pam and an addition to Arthur’s archetypal terrace that hadn’t yet come to fruition. A shared project to mark the start of the clients’ married life, His and Hers House completes the reconfiguration of Arthur’s terrace by melding together the original plans with qualities drawn from Cross Stitch House. From the cool, dark interiors of the terrace’s refurbished entry hall and bedrooms, the addition presents as a bright and airy inversion. The striking, skewed pitch of Cross Stitch House is echoed in the expansive living volume; the transposed silhouette a memory of “her” previous life. The angular ceiling plane is punctuated with dramatic, triangulated skylights, forming an interlaced geometry of two shapes meeting at a point, an infinity symbol of sorts that speaks of the continuity of the clients’ love. The raked ceiling soars to 4.5 metres at its highest point, giving a generous sense of scale and volume to the main living area. The space is richly layered with warm honeyed timbers, including crown-cut Tasmanian oak and plywood cabinetry. Subtle tonal shifts are visible in the Tasmanian oak flooring, with knots, sap-lines and cracks giving a sense of humility to the timber and celebrating the beauty of natural inflection. A lush courtyard is thoughtfully brought to the heart of the house, establishing a sunlit centre around which daily activities can intuitively occur. Timber-framed glazing exposes the full width of the living area to the garden, encouraging outdoor living while providing excellent solar access and passive ventilation. The northern orientation of the courtyard effectively extends the living volume while increasing the thermal comfort and environmental efficiency of the home.
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HIS AND HERS HOUSE
3 Melbourne, Vic
Alteration + addition
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Family
Having previously lived in the leafy Melbourne suburb of Ivanhoe, Pam was accustomed to an extensive garden. While comparatively small in size, the courtyard of His and Hers House, landscaped in collaboration with Eckersley Garden Architecture, provides much amenity and delight for the couple. The perimeter is brimming with soft foliage steadily climbing to create a dappled canopy from which delicate coloured glass pendants are gently suspended. A discreet water feature bubbles and splutters – a cooling, ambient addition. As the home hugs the boundary of the block, there is little presence to its exterior form other than from the courtyard vantage, where modest compressed fibre cement cladding has been thoughtfully detailed to “make a simple material a lot more refined,” explains Fiona. Embedded strip lighting lines the angled junction of wall and window, animating the geometries of the house when lit at night. From these angled architectural planes to the triangulated cabinetry pulls, “there is continuity down to the smallest detail,” creating a design language for the home that is devotedly referenced throughout. Inside the home, the main bedroom and ensuite are accessed via a ramp along the house’s southern edge, allowing for wheelchair access to see the couple into their senior years. The raked ceiling slopes to its lowest height along this axis to negotiate planning regulations while maintaining the southern neighbour’s access to natural light. This otherwise transitional space is optimized for storage, utility and display. Custom joinery lines the full length of the wall, with the paredback palette of timber, white tessellated tiles and mirror providing a fresh and unassuming backdrop for the couple’s combined collection of artwork, furniture, plants and books; and for “new connections, experiences and stories,” as Fiona asserts. With the ceiling sitting no higher than the original fence height, the chamber-like corridor gives a sense of spatial compression that enhances the transition to the lofty private zones beyond. The main bedroom turns its back to the rest of the house, affording a sense of privacy and seclusion for the couple. Custom sliding doors painted in a rich ochre colour open to an intimate private courtyard, complete with a mirrored gate to increase the sense of space, maximizing the possibilities of the narrow site. An inherent wash of natural light is maintained throughout the house and the landscape is ever-present. “Although the rooms are small,” says Fiona, “every space has a garden aspect.” This gives a sense of generosity and delight that allows the house to transcend typical experiences of bathing, resting and working, transforming the couple’s daily life. With its quiet, suburban sensibility, His and Hers House intrinsically links internal and external spaces through a continuation of form and volume. Underpinned by the fundamental tenets of a well-designed home – natural light, passive ventilation and sensitive material selections – the house supports the simple, daily enactment of the clients’ new, shared life while serving as a metaphor for their eternal bond and commitment.
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ALTERATION + ADDITION
2 Site Floor
218 m² 158 m²
Design 8 m Build 7 m
Products Roofing: Lysaght Klip-lok in Colorbond ‘Shale Grey’ and Custom Orb in Colorbond ‘Woodland Grey’ External walls: James Hardie Scyon Axon cladding in Dulux ‘Grey Pebble’ Internal Walls: Plasterboard walls in Dulux ‘Whisper White’; Provans Tasmanian oak in Bona Traffic Windows: Custom solid Victorian ash frames in clear oil Doors: Custom doors by Basis Builders Flooring: Provans Tasmanian oak flooring in Bona Traffic; Rugs Carpet and Design Savanna carpet Lighting: Mark Douglass glass pendants; Masson for Light track lighting Kitchen: Fisher and Paykel integrated fridge; V-Zug oven and cooktop; Qasair rangehood; Laminex laminate benchtops in ‘White’; custom door pulls Bathroom: Inax Yohen Border tiles in ‘YB102’ from Artedomus; tiles from Academy Tiles and Surfaces; Reece basins; Astra Walker tapware; Caroma toilets Furniture: Feelgood Designs dining chairs; Jardan lounge, armchair and coffee table; outdoor dining table by the architect
01 Twin skylights meet to form an abstract infinity symbol, which represents the owners’ relationship.
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02 The roofline takes cues from Cross Stitch House, designed by FMD Architects for one of the owners in 2013. 03 A ramped hallway, lined with shelves for displaying treasured objects, connects the kitchen and living space to the main bedroom. Artwork: Emma White.
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HIS AND HERS HOUSE
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ALTERATION + ADDITION
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04 Tasmanian oak is used in flooring, wall lining and joinery as a unifying material with slightly varied tones and textures. 05 Faceted shapes are the basis for a design language that unites interior and exterior spaces.
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HIS AND HERS HOUSE
06 A central, northern courtyard, brimming with foliage, answers the owners’ desire for sunlight, ventilation and prospect. 07 The house hugs the boundaries of the block, with pocket courtyards providing a garden outlook to every room.
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Architect FMD Architects +61 3 9670 9671 fmd@fmdarchitects.com.au fmdarchitects.com.au
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ALTERATION + ADDITION
Project team: Fiona Dunin, Alice Edmonds, Robert Kolak, Joe Dalgleish, Andrew Carija Builder: Basis Builders Engineer: Perrett Simpson Landscape designer: Eckersley Garden Architecture
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HIS & HERS HOUSE MEET THE OWNERS
FMD Architects’ full-service design and project management left the owners of His and Hers House (see page 38) feeling confident about their build. Here, Stephanie McGann chats with Pam Mitchell and Arthur Apted about working with an architect on their reimagined terrace in Melbourne’s Clifton Hill.
WORKING WITH AN ARCHITECT Photography by Peter Bennetts
Stephanie McGann Could you share with us a little about your family and background? Pam Mitchell I’m a chartered accountant and I currently work for a philanthropic trust. I have two adult children and I’ve just recently become a grandma. Arthur Apted Pam and I got married three years ago. I was, at the time, living in an old house just around the corner from Pam’s house in Clifton Hill. We engaged Fiona Dunin of FMD Architects to renovate my house to become His and Hers House, where we now live together with one of my sons, Lindsay.
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01 The owners of His and Hers House chose an architect whose work they were familiar with. 02 A single-storey design ensures the home’s livability as the owners grow old there together. 03 The architect’s expertise in project management resulted in a smooth build and a home the clients love.
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HIS AND HERS HOUSE
SM How did you discover Fiona and FMD Architects? AA I set up and ran a property investment trust for industry superannuation funds, which did work with architects. One of the architects that we engaged was John Wardle of John Wardle Architects, where Fiona worked prior to founding FMD Architects. John, who is a good friend of mine, recommends Fiona highly. When I first planned to renovate my house years ago, I approached Fiona. We drew up plans, but that particular project never got off the ground. When Pam was renovating her own house, she also chose to work with Fiona. Now we’ve completed His and Hers House, our first house together, and we’re in the process of doing a house on our farm on Bruny Island in Tasmania. SM What inspired the project’s name, His and Hers House? PM Fiona merged her original drawings for Arthur’s house, which were about six years old by that time, with some of the features from my house to create His and Hers House. I love light and, as she did in my house, Fiona has incorporated skylights and large windows with an outlook to the garden into our His and Hers House.
SM What drew you to again work with an architect, and Fiona at FMD in particular? AA When you work with a decent architect, firstly, you get a result that’s nice – at the end of the day, we just like Fiona’s work. Secondly, the architect can do the project management – it can be very difficult for home owners to be effective project managers. PM Fiona managed our entire project and she combines her skills in architecture with her background in interior design. She’s on the ball, highly efficient, creative and open to new ideas. SM How did you prepare for your first meeting with Fiona? AA An important starting point was to have an idea of what we were prepared to spend on the project and to set a budget. PM I’ve done two of these now and I always factor in a 5 percent contingency. We’ve just about come in on budget each time. AA Fiona asked us to prepare a project brief, which started as a bit of a wishlist simply written down on a piece of paper and, over a couple of meetings, was developed and sharpened. PM You would probably call it a very open brief, though. We wanted Fiona to bring her ideas and imagination to it.
SM Is the result of working with an architect what you expected? AA Yes, very much so. We think it’s a great house. Other people come to visit and say they’d love to live here. We love the natural light and the way the deck area is configured, with plants that will eventually grow over the top to form a canopy. It’s all pretty special. PM The living area and deck really open up to the north. It is beautiful. SM What advice would you give to someone who is thinking of working with an architect? AA You are far better off working with good people, who know their profession and expertise, engaging them on reasonable terms and letting them do their job without micromanaging them. If you choose the right architect for you and your project, and you respect the professional standing of the people involved on site, you get a happy workplace and a good outcome. You also need to determine with the architect what it is that you’re looking for in a home and you need to have some comfort with the work they normally produce, their style. PM Choose an architect who is receptive to your lifestyle and understands what you want, what’s important in your world.
SM Could you tell us more about the brief? AA We’re both in our early sixties and the main thing we wanted was for our home to be a single storey with no stairs. Fiona created a ramp to meet the slope of the block. We envisage this to be our home for life. Also, I work from home, so we needed flexibility in one of the rooms so that it can be very quickly converted from an office into a spare bedroom when needed. PM Arthur has an extensive vinyl record collection so that had to be accommodated in this house, too. AA With Fiona, we designed this beautiful cabinet to put the stereo in. It’s built on top of a big concrete plinth so that the turntable needle doesn’t bounce. Over the years, we’ve been to many parties where people bounce the needle off the records with their dancing! SM Did you have much involvement in the progress on site? AA Every two weeks or so we would have a site meeting. We’d take a look at everything and chat with all the builders, and Fiona would take minutes on her iPad then and there, so it was all incredibly efficient. These were some of the only times we really spoke directly with everyone on site. If you’ve got an architect engaged as the project manager, then you’re well advised, in our view, to have the architect manage the dialogue between yourself and the builders and contractors.
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You are far better off working with good people, who know their profession and expertise.
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WORKING WITH AN ARCHITECT
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MORA O N E T O W AT C H
Cultivating a dialogue between architecture, community, and context, James Fraser, director of Makers of Responsive Architecture (MORA), designs homes inspired by landscape. Words by Linda Cheng Photography by Brigid Arnott
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It’s common for an architect to think of their work as their “baby,” but James Fraser speaks of his buildings, not as though they are fully fledged creations, but as things to be nurtured. “Through the design process, it’s almost like we have an embryo that we are bringing to life,” James says. “It will have its own personality and sense of the world. All we do is act with care and allow it to be the best thing that it’s going to be – almost like we’re raising it to be a good citizen in the built environment, to be good to the people who inhabit it, and to give them a sense of joy and connection.” James completed a large part of his early career in London, where he spent some time working on the refurbishment of Royal Festival Hall by Allies and Morrison – in particular, the auditorium. “I was struck by how the architecture is so dynamic. Practically the whole auditorium responded to the various needs of the acoustics and the performance and production requirements,” he says. “It made me really interested in how buildings can have a life that is responsive.” James also acknowledges the collaborative process that is required in order to bring a building to life. “At the start of a project, I really like not knowing what the solution is going to be,” he says. “Listening well to the owners, and giving a sense of ownership to the builders and anybody who is bringing their expertise to the building [is important] … Through this creative coming together, a problem presents an opportunity.” After nearly two decades of experience working for architects including Brian Suters, Peter Stutchbury, David Boyle and Allies and Morrison, James returned to the Central Coast of New South Wales, where he’s originally from, to set up a life and practice immersed in the natural setting of the area. He started his practice, MORA, four years go with the idea that “architecture is something that is born and then responds.” His projects include alterations and additions to old coastal cottages and new houses on bushland sites.
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One such house is Killcare Beach Bush House, which was awarded a Commendation in the Residential Architecture – Houses (New) category at the 2018 New South Wales Architecture Awards. The house, located on one of the last remaining vacant sites on its street, held a beautiful stand of angophora trees that the clients wanted to retain. “It’s a beautiful characteristic of the site that we really wanted the building to be in dialogue with,” says James. Sitting at the edge of Bouddi National Park, the house was proposed as a “journey through landscape” on a steeply sloping site. The two-storey dwelling is set on a concrete platform with a garage and entry pavilion below at street level. From the street, the pathway to the house directs the occupants to a reinstated native garden and a courtyard, and then terminates at the upper living area, which offers a view toward Putty Beach and the Pacific Ocean. The concrete platform relates to the sandstone outcrops of the area, while the form of the steel-and-glass building above relates to the bending and twisting shapes of the banksias and angophoras. “The materials are very spare, it’s just steel, glass and concrete with plywood joinery. The details in the plywood joinery also reflect a similar language that kind of relates to the unpredictable shapes of the angophoras.” James draws most of his inspiration from nature. “A lot of my work now is [focused on enabling people] to connect better with each other and better with nature,” he says. “I think we can live with a lot less and often we’re happier when we have less.” James likes the idea that his buildings might “find a simple place and make ordinary people happy.” He says that people value details, like the moment the sunlight comes in from the west for ten minutes before it disappears again. “There are all these really joyful things that are better than having extra bathrooms and three-car garages. That’s when design can delight and is victorious in the outcome.” moraworkshop.com
MORA
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01 James Fraser founded MORA four years ago on the Central Coast of New South Wales. 02 Killcare Beach Bush House (2017) is an experiment in responsive design.
04 House in a Paddock, which is under construction, is one in a series of upcoming projects located on coastal and bushland sites.
03 Planning and details are informed by the unpredictable geometries of the Australian landscape
05 Durable material combinations result in spaces that are robust, uncluttered and suited to context.
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ONE TO WATCH
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Bookshelf
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01 Petite Places: Clever Interiors for Humble Homes edited by Robert Klanten and Tessa Pearson (Gestalten, 2018) Much like the projects it features, Petite Places makes the most of the space available. Featuring more than seventy projects across its 256 pages, the book traces the history of all things small living – from the egalitarian houses of the Neolithic town of Çatalhöyük, to the “grand experiment of new living” in the 1920s and ‘30s, through to the present day. Le Corbusier’s first Unitéd’Habitation project, La Cité Radieuse (1952), is presented in all its glory, along with other pioneering projects such as Ricardo Boffill’s Moorishinspired Walden 7 in Barcelona (1975). Most of the houses are of a more recent vintage, however, and show off today’s best in small living design from around the world. Among the Australian entries is Catseye Bay’s intervention to a dilapidated, thirty-sixsquare-metre apartment in Sydney’s Kings Cross. Inspired by the building’s Art Deco curves, the local practice designed bespoke, multi-functional pieces of joinery that divide the unit into comfortable living spaces. In an era of unprecedented densification, this book shows that well-designed small spaces can be a joy to live in.
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02 Bruce Rickard: A Life in Architecture edited by Julie Cracknell, Peter Lonergan and Sam Rickard (New South Publishing, 2018) If the mark of an architect is the influence their work has on the people who inhabit it, then Bruce Rickard (1929–2010) was of a rare sort. A highlight of this comprehensive monograph on Bruce, one of Australia’s most significant architects of the twentieth century, is the contribution from those who have lived in his houses. Design writer Karen McCartney, for instance, meditates (in a letter to Bruce near the end of his life) on the experience of living in the Marshall House: “It has enriched our lives and that of our children and when all is said and done there is no greater influence anyone can have.” A key member of the Sydney School, Bruce designed more than eighty houses across his sixty-year career, most of them around the North Shore and Northern Beaches of Sydney. A proponent of organic architecture, he was (and is) persistently compared to Frank Lloyd Wright; a comparison that this book seeks to challenge and complicate.Through contributions from architects, academics and family members this book presents an architect who helped develop a uniquely Australian architecture, an architecture that is at one with the landscape of this country.
03 Houses: Extraordinary Living by Phaidon editors (Phaidon Press, 2019) Though this ambitious book from Phaidon shares the name of this magazine, it is an entirely different beast. Setting out to present a cross-section of the “most remarkable residential achievements of the modern era,” Houses: Extraordinary Living features some four hundred homes, ranging from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present, from Art Nouveau to neo-modernist. The houses are presented in pairs, with the juxtaposition between houses designed to inspire readers to form their own connections. On one spread, Adolf Loos’s Steiner House (1910), a project that embodies his “ornament and crime” philosophy, sits next to Saverio Busiri Vici’s Villa Ronconi (1973), defined by its playfully geometric layers of exposed concrete. On another, John Wardle Architect’s Bruny Island Shearer’s Quarters (2011) is mirrored by UN Studio’s W.I.N.D House (2014), which sits in a similarly scenic landscape by the sea in North Holland, the Netherlands. It’s a unique way of presenting projects, one that shows each house in a new light and encourages reflection on the changing forms of residential architecture.
READING
04 Paddington: A History edited by Greg Young (New South Publishing in association with the Paddington Society, 2019) A history of a Sydney suburb put together by the local heritage society may not sound like a particularly enthralling prospect. But Paddington: A History belies any such expectations, providing fascinating insight into the development of Paddington’s architecture and its people. The book begins with an investigation of the Cadigal people who have occupied the land for tens of thousands of years, of the Cadigal influence on the landscape and of the devastating impacts of colonialism. It goes on to explore the diverse communities that have made Paddington home over the centuries, including postwar migrant, bohemian and LGBTIQ residents and successive waves of gentrifiers. Underscoring all of this is an exploration of the suburb’s distinctive architecture and the Jane Jacobs-like efforts that have gone into protecting it. Paddington is one of the largest and most intact enclaves of Victorian architecture in the world. Architect Robert Brown and architectural historian Robert Griffin trace the creation and evolution of Victorian Paddington, with a particular focus on the suburb’s terrace houses, and provide a compendium of the various forms of the terrace house.
2019 events announced: Housing Futures Melbourne, 26 July A forum about new trajectories in residential architecture.
Work Place / Work Life Sydney, 28 August A forum about the future of workplace design.
The Architecture Symposium Sydney, 4 October Giving voice to Australia’s world-class architects.
Old School / New School Sydney, 16 October A forum about the future of education design.
Design Speaks presents Australia’s most influential portfolio of seminars and conferences for design professionals and their clients. For partnership opportunities, to purchase tickets and to register for updates visit:
designspeaks.com.au PRESEN TED BY
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Jonathan West FURNITURE DESIGN
Imbued with a sense of contradiction, playfulness and tactility, the furniture designs of Sydney-based Jonathan West are highly considered and crafted and show a deft understanding of materials. Words by Rebecca Gross Photography by Shauna Greyerbiehl
The expressed simplicity of Jonathan West’s work belies its complex construction. In fact, much of Jonathan’s work is imbued with a sense of contradiction, which speaks to his desire to produce playful, tactile pieces that encourage interaction. Solid-looking pieces are actually lightweight; clean, geometric forms are fused with intricately crafted joints; and materials and textures are combined to accentuate contrasting qualities. Jonathan established his eponymous studio in 2013. Following his joinery apprenticeship, he worked in various design-oriented workshops, including a stint with the Australian Museum and in set building. Now based in St Peters, Sydney, he has grown his studio to a team of six that produces furniture, joinery and objects as bespoke pieces, one-off commissions and site-specific works in collaboration with architects and designers. Jonathan primarily works with timber, drawn to its inherent tactility, but also explores and experiments with other materials and incorporates steel, brass, copper, glass, mirror and leather. “I want my pieces to be tactile and for people to want to touch them, interact with them, feel a texture or a contrast of materials,” Jonathan explains. This is evident in the Kamaji sideboard, which contrasts light
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and dark and rough and smooth, with hand-carved white oak doors sliding open to reveal Tasmanian blackwood drawers. A sense of playfulness is also important to Jonathan in his work, as he creates pieces that are deceptively light and reference a variety of stylistic inspirations. “I wear my influences on my sleeve and they change all the time,” he says. Brass cabinets have sleek Art Deco curves; timber tables with graceful tapered legs and base are reminiscent of Grant Featherston’s work; and mirror-topped side tables reflect the fun of the Memphis Group. However, Jonathan’s work undoubtedly carries its own signature character, particularly in the highly considered and crafted junctions and joints, which often serve as the starting point of his creative process. The Heavy Chair, with its four geometric pieces that appear to effortlessly rest and slot together, encapsulates his style and approach. “It’s simplistically a clean form that’s assembled nicely, but there are a lot of complicated components within it,” he says. Jonathan designed Heavy Chair, which is made with lightweight plywood, to challenge the status quo in furniture design. “I try not to rehash what’s in the market, but I’m also not trying to be radical for the sake of it,” he says. jonathanwest.com.au
STUDIO
01 Designer Jonathan West heads a team of six, producing joinery, objects and furniture. 02 The Heavy Chair, made from plywood, was designed to challenge the status quo in furniture design. 03 The In Brass N2 cabinet features sleek art deco curves. 04 The Every Occasion table is reminiscent of the work of Grant Featherston, one of Jonathan’s influences.
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Home PERFORMANCE
Combining theatre, choreography and audience participation, Geoff Sobelle’s Home raises questions about domestic fantasy, housing stress and the nostalgia we reserve for the spaces we live in. Words by Rachel Harris Photography by Victor Frankowski
As designers, patrons and followers of both architecture and Houses magazine, we can be forgiven for our preoccupation with the built “house.” However, one of this year’s Sydney Festival highlights, performed at the Rosslyn Packer Theatre, challenged us to go beyond the physical and aesthetic confines of the house and remember the importance of home. The performance work Home is a captivating collaboration between the set designer, illusion consultant, cast and an activated audience that is viewed as “fair game” by the show’s creator, Geoff Sobelle. Refreshingly, the material of the largely wordless production is space rather than script, as domestic stories develop in response to the physical parameters of the set. Geoff, who confesses to feeling most “at home” in the theatre, begins the piece on an empty stage and, armed with a staple gun, the part-builder, part-illusionist starts to construct his own domestic space to make himself at home. But his room is swiftly inhabited by others, as actors seamlessly exchange places to establish multiple concurrent narratives. A two-storey skeletal structure appears glowing on stage in dust sheet utero. The revealed house is then both completed and inhabited in a flurry of activity. Uniformed construction lemmings in hard hats install walls and toilets while occupants arrange personal belongings, as the roles of house builder and homemaker are deliberately distinguishable. Repetition of everyday domestic rituals and interweaving activities allude to the layering of time as past, present and future residents live together in this house. This busy scene calls to mind the modernist take on the house as “a machine for living in” (Le Corbusier, 1923). Loud, frantic mass activity contrasts with quiet solitary moments of experiencing dawn light and birdsong. A lone musician sings in haunting tones to the audience, “Your first home will be your mother’s bones.” We are reminded that home transcends the architectural confines of the house to encompass and connect with both body and place. Our physical connection to a home may be temporary and fleeting as we consider those that will inhabit our spaces in the future and those who have been there before.
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HOME
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01 In Home, a house is built onstage, piece by piece, illustrating a disconnect between housing production and occupation. 02 Rather than relying on dialogue, the largely wordless narrative plays out as a spatial interaction. 03 The audience is cajoled to join the performance, resulting in a house party, before things start to fall apart.
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PERFORMANCE
The constructed stage house (although easily larger than my own rented corner of Sydney), is intentionally abstract and timeless, creating an unfinished vessel into which the audience’s own nostalgic memories of home can pour. This passive connection becomes active participation as audience members are invited (or rather cajoled) to join the spectacle, bolstering cast numbers to create a chaotic but carefully choreographed house party. The party does not last forever, though. Housing stresses are represented by burst plumbing, falling shelves and fire. We are aware that the security of home can be quickly lost if the machine breaks down. The piece ends with an empty, abandoned house. The discarded shell is seemingly also left out for curb-side collection with boxes of unwanted belongings. A successful home provides a secure anchor for a whole community of people, who may be cast adrift if the housing system were to break down. The wider importance of home is not a new realization. The longest serving Australian prime minister, Robert Menzies, recognized home as “the indispensable condition of continuity; its health determines the health of society as a whole” (1942). But as house prices make daily headlines, homelessness numbers rise and the rental market is increasingly a speculative investor’s playground, it has perhaps been somewhat forgotten. Home comes to Sydney as a timely reminder that the fundamental reason for the construction of a house should be for the creation of a healthy home, which in turn will allow both the individual and society as a whole to flourish. Home was held at the Roslyn Packer Theatre, 9–18 January 2019, as part of Sydney Festival.
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CAMPERDOWN WAREHOUSE BY ARCHER OFFICE
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Fusing concepts inherent in furniture design and architecture, this conversion of a former motor vehicle factory in Sydney serves as a prototype for a novel approach to adaptive re-use. Words by Tobias Horrocks Photography by Kasia Werstak
If there is a relationship between furniture design and building design, Tomek Archer would know it. He won design awards for his Campfire Table while still an architecture student. Now a fully fledged architect, Tomek has headed up his own practice, Archer Office, for the past five years. The office’s project range is wide. He describes the extremes of its design output as running from “a very high level of control” as with his furniture design, to needing to wield “diplomacy” with large commercial developments. The smaller projects inform the larger ones and vice versa. The Camperdown Warehouse project is about as close to the furniture end of the architecture spectrum as it gets. You might think that reworking an apartment interior would be the perfect project for the furniture-designercum-architect, but in fact it would normally be too small a job for Archer Office. It’s the first residential interior the practice has completed and the budget was tight. Tomek says he took it on because it contained such an interesting set of conditions for exploring ideas around adaptive re-use. The base building, which dates from 1926, is a former motor vehicle factory comprised of a heavy concrete frame with long-span floors and no internal structural walls.“The cool thing about the building is that it is so loose fit. And that’s something we explore a lot,” says Tomek. The design team was motivated by the idea of developing a “prototype,” as Tomek puts it – a model for adaptive re-use that could be applied to future projects. The industrial building was converted to a residential complex in 1993. The client purchased an apartment on the first floor, which has exceptionally high ceilings (4.9 metres). This apartment contained two mezzanine bedrooms that faced the street and also blocked a lot of the available light from the double-height living spaces behind. Tomek and his client decided to completely gut the interior and start from scratch. With no structural partitions to lean on, all the mezzanine floors had to be supported on columns that reached the floor slab. Archer Office has added more mezzanine floor space, turning it into a three-bedroom apartment while allowing more light to reach the living spaces. This was achieved using black-painted steel, natural timber and generous
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CAMPERDOWN WAREHOUSE
2 Sydney, NSW
Warehouse renovation
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amounts of glass, including a glazed structural floor in the mezzanine walkway. The space can be adjusted and adapted to a variety of use conditions. Sliding screens and bifold doors abound. The client couple can open the whole place as a single volume or compartmentalize it in various ways when hosting guests. “Furniture is an adaptive re-use project,” claims Tomek. “It transforms the way space is used.” His Campfire Table, whose three timber legs interlock to form a reciprocal frame that supports a circular sheet of glass, is a physical invitation to gather, a piece of infrastructure that performs a social function. Adding or removing furniture and other interior elements to an existing space is “changing the performance,” as Tomek puts it. The kitchen in Camperdown Warehouse, for example, is comprised of a single island bench. All the appliances and cupboards are within this built-in furniture, which alters the way the kitchen performs socially. The cooktop is at one end and the act of cooking literally becomes a “performance.” According to the client, dinner guests frequently help to prepare the meal as they chat with the chef. Just from looking at the details, it is clear that this project was designed by an architecture practice with a very good grasp of materials and the art of assembly. The inbuilt shelving in the kitchen, far from simply providing adjustable shelves, instead uses permanent welds between the steel blades to create a rigid frame that supports the walkway above. The spacing of the verticals was adjusted to accommodate rows of wine bottles in a cupboard below. By making the furniture double as structure, Archer Office maximizes space and visual elegance. A key strategy in achieving a very high level of refinement was the decision to work with a trusted steel contractor and to make a large proportion of the project out of this single material. Steel is used in the windows, the joinery and, of course, the structure. The vast majority of the details were bespoke creations. In removing the previous apartment interior, the designers cut right back to the raw concrete. The original 1920s concrete appears monolithic, almost ancient Egyptian in its mass and form, especially in the main bedroom, where the column capitals are close to head height. It openly displays its industrial past, including a chopped-off wiring conduit. Archer Office has leveraged the loose fit quality of the 1920s factory, showing off just how much potential remains in industrial architecture as a typology. “I don’t know how long the apartment will last in this configuration. Twenty, fifty years?” Tomek speculates. In some ways the design is highly specific and in others highly adaptable. Either way, the whole thing could be taken out as if it were a temporary installation ... just like furniture.
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WAREHOUSE RENOVATION
2 Floor
130 m²
Design 7 m Build 6 m
Per m² $2,500
Products Internal walls: Viridian Lineus glass partitions Doors: External glass door by Aluminium and Glass Constructions Flooring: Havwoods American oak flooring Lighting: Brightgreen track lights and downlights; Flos Glo-Ball wall light Kitchen: Bora Basic stove; Oliveri Santorini sink; Phoenix Vivid slimline tap Bathroom: Oliveri Santorini sink, Kohler Chalice Vessel basin, Phoenix Blix flexible hose sink mixer Heating and cooling: Ozshade blinds and curtains Other: Custom doors and joinery by the builder; steel fabrication by Metwork Services; Campfire Table by Tomek Archer; Artek Armchair 41 “Paimio” by Alvar Aalto and Woodnotes rug from Anibou
01 Enveloped by historic factory architecture, custom fabricated steel elements support new spaces for living.
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02 A monolithic island bench is an anchoring point for gathering in an otherwise loose fit design. 03 Steel shelving serves as structure, supporting the weight of the new mezzanine level. 04 Translucent surfaces blur the line between rooms, creating a visual extension of space.
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WAREHOUSE RENOVATION
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Archer Office has leveraged the loose fit quality of the 1920s factory, showing off just how much potential remains in industrial architecture as a typology.
Axonometric
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05 Sliding panels and bifold doors allow the interior to return to its original singular volume. Artwork: Elliott “Numskull� Routledge. 06 A mezzanine level housing two bedrooms hovers at the middle point of a double-height space. 07 In an ultimate act of spatial flexibility, the entire fitout is designed to be easily altered or removed like furniture.
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Architect Archer Office +61 2 9191 7326 studio@archeroffice.com archeroffice.com
Project team: Tomek Archer, Carmen Blanco Builder: Arc Engineer: Partridge
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STRADBROKE HOUSE BY GABRIEL & ELIZABETH POOLE DESIGN C O M PA N Y WITH TIM B E N N E T TO N ARCHITECTS
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Well versed in designing for the tropical Queensland climate, the architects have collaborated to deliver an exuberant South Stradbroke Island holiday home for the owner and her four grandsons. Words by Michelle Bailey Photography by Mindi Cooke
South Stradbroke Island lies to the north of the Gold Coast, Queensland, forming a twenty-one-kilometrelong stretch of sand that divides the Broadwater from the Coral Sea. Largely a conservation park, South Stradbroke Island has a rich cultural and ecological history, preserved by virtue of its relative isolation in the absence of bridge and barge connections to the mainland. Stradbroke House, designed by Gabriel and Elizabeth Poole Design Company in association with Tim Bennetton Architects, is one in a scattering of island dwellings concentrated at the southern end of the island, just a short stroll from the calm shores of the Broadwater. At its simplest, Stradbroke House is a holiday home, designed to accommodate the owner, Lori, and visiting friends and family, including her four grandsons. The project reunites longstanding collaborators: Royal Australian Institute of Architects Gold Medallist Gabriel Poole, artist Elizabeth Poole, Brisbane architect Tim Bennetton, steel fabricator Barry Hamlet, canvas and blind manufacturer Mike Murray, builder Charles Warren, engineer Rod Bligh and cabinetmaker Des Shield. Each was dedicated to overcoming the challenges of designing, fabricating and constructing a bespoke dwelling on a highly regulated sand island accessible only by private vessel. Gabriel and Tim’s command of lightweight construction, using custom steel fabrication, is a predilection well suited to the constraints of building in a harsh and isolated environment. Stradbroke House was conceived as two steel-framed pavilions linked
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by a breezeway and serviced by water and power generated on site. The western pavilion – a single storey with an open plan – unites living, kitchen and dining areas, and extends outward to a deep northern verandah. The eastern pavilion comprises two storeys and accommodates bathing and sleeping. On the ground floor, the exterior walls of the twin rumpus rooms fold down to create four, canvas-roofed sleeping pods. Upstairs, three conventional bedrooms are connected to the ground floor, rather unconventionally, by means of both an internal staircase and an external water slide. Stradbroke House embodies Gabriel’s trademark lyricism, expressed through the structural rhythm of steel portal frames with raking arms, which extend beyond the roofline like tent poles stretching in tension. It is this succession of white masts that first appears through the tree canopy as you approach the site via the sandy beach track. Their image, combined with the ephemeral quality of the building, is reminiscent of Gabriel and Elizabeth’s Lake Weyba House (1996). However, Stradbroke House is a building realized under a very different set of circumstances. In order to streamline transportation and construction processes, walls and roofs were clad in simple sheet materials – compressed fibre cement and zincalume, respectively. Concrete floors establish the house as a more grounded version of earlier kin, but are somewhat disguised by encircling verandahs, which give the impression that the building floats over the landscape.
NEW HOUSE
01 The architects' honed command of lightweight construction was well suited to building on the relatively isolated South Stradbroke Island site. 02 On the northern verandah, netted hammock seats lean in unison with the architecture, appearing to float over and into the landscape.
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6+ Stradbroke Island, Qld
Holiday home
Extended family
3 +4 sleep-outs
+1 outdoor bath
Site Floor
725 m² 284 m²
Design 1 y 1 m Build 1 y 8 m
Per m² $4,500
Products Roofing: Lysaght Custom Orb and Trimdek in Colorbond ‘Windspray’ External walls: James Hardie HardieFlex 6 mm sheet; hot-dip galvanized steel structure from Studio Steel Doors: Centor S1E Eco-Screen insect and solar-control screen; custom sliding doors by Studio Steel Internal walls: Plasterboard in Resene ‘Thorndon Cream’ Flooring: Leto Bamboo flooring Lighting: General lighting from Inlite; LED lighting from Energypro Kitchen: Cabinetry in silver ash by Des Shield; Samsung fridge and microwave; Smeg oven Heating and cooling: Gasmate PS90 Pellet Heater; Hunter Pacific Concept 2 ceiling fan External elements: Modwood Flame Shield Decking Other: Sleeping pods by Studio Steel with Creative Canvas and Blinds; custom dining table by Des Shield; custom punkah fans by Des Shield with Steel Studio; Family Tree and Bird Spiral art installations by Elizabeth Poole
The home’s architecture is most exuberant along the home’s northern edge, with openings tuned to a coastal, subtropical context and feathered edges fashioned for shade. Sliding glass doors at the lower level and aluminium roller doors above maximize the facade’s openable surface area. “The garage door system was first used on Lake Weyba House,” Gabriel explains. “It gives you an enormous amount of light and ventilation in summer. In winter you can roll them down and with a northern aspect they [absorb warmth from the sun and] act as heaters.” Complexity is injected through bespoke components, including the verandah awning and hammock seats, which are both supported by leaning steel columns. The awning comprises a series of aluminium angles laid on webbing and stretched between purlins. It is slung with a casualness that belies the importance of its role as a sunshade device – its sweeping curve reaffirming the ephemeral nature of the whole. Below the awning, the verandah is cast in half-light with the glare from the intense Queensland sky tempered. Netted seats, stretched between purlins, invite one to pause on the edge of the verandah and to lean in unison with the architecture. The nostalgia of camping is emulated in the sleeping pavilion by its canvas-roofed sleeping pods and outdoor bathroom. The fold-down bedrooms were developed by the design team in order to minimize the building’s footprint, as prescribed by planning restrictions. This inventive solution, however, was driven equally, if not more so, by poetics. The sleeping pods give a sense of ownership to each grandson, inviting him to sleep beneath canvas, mosquito net or sky. The opportunity to engage with the natural qualities of the setting returns with the ceremony of bathing in a walled garden. In the context of Gabriel’s distinguished career and decade-long partnership with Tim Bennetton, Stradbroke House supports a shared and continued interest in the pursuit of innovation and fulfils an agenda to build sustainably and conscientiously. The house is a masterclass in the problemsolving demands of architecture, overcome through the mutual trust between Lori and the exceptional design team. Equally poetic and pragmatic, Stradbroke House possesses the rare and opposing qualities of impermanence and longevity.
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03 The home consists of two steel-framed pavilions: one, a doubleheighted space, unites kitchen, dining and living areas and extends to the deep verandah. 04 The arrangement of sliding glass doors at ground level and aluminium roller doors above optimizes air flow and moderates the home’s internal temperature.
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05 Encircling the western pavilion, the verandah becomes a breezeway between the home’s two wings. 06 Four fold-down “sleeping pod,” invite visitors to sleep beneath canvas, mosquito net or sky. 07 The top floor is reserved for a sleeping wing comprising three bedrooms. Artwork: Nguyen Dang Huy.
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The sleeping pavilion emulates the nostalgia of camping with canvas sleeping pods and an outdoor bathroom.
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Architect Gabriel and Elizabeth Poole Design Company (GEPDC) +61 7 3846 0064 gabriel@gabrielpoole.com.au
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Architect Tim Bennetton Architects +61 7 3846 0064 tim@timbennetton.com.au timbennetton.com.au
GEPDC project team: Gabriel Poole, Elizabeth Poole Tim Bennetton Architects project team: Tim Bennetton, Simon Martin Interior design: Elizabeth Poole Builder: Charles Warren Constructions Engineer: Bligh Tanner Steel fabricator: Studio Steele Canvas elements: Creative Canvas and Blinds Landscape designer: Steven Clegg Design Joiner: Des Shield
NEW HOUSE
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C LO U D HOUSE BY A K I N AT E L I E R
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CLOUD HOUSE
A restful sanctuary for a couple who share their time between Singapore and Sydney, this new house in Bondi uses carefully considered apertures and subtle texture to create a sense of unencumbered space and levity.
Words by Rebecca Gross Photography by Murray Fredericks
Some of the most considered decisions an architect makes in the course of a project are often the most discreet in the finished product. They are also an opportunity to learn and investigate new ideas. “This one was about apertures and light and it became a way of testing our experience and understanding,” says Kelvin Ho, founding director of Akin Atelier. Indeed, Akin Atelier’s meticulous attention to junctions and openings heightens the experience of Cloud House, creating the sense of uninterrupted space and the ease of effortless function. The clients, who live between Singapore and Sydney, wanted a house in Bondi where they could relax and enjoy the outdoors and sunlight, a house that would be a family home in the future. They also wanted their living space at the rear of the house, but this was the south-facing end of the site. “It was therefore about how to puncture the volume with apertures of different angles and sizes so that light fractures through to the middle of the building,” Kelvin explains. A courtyard, a double-height glazed wall, a raked ceiling and skylights bring sunlight into the house, with materials that react to the light helping to create an easy, calming environment. The house is comprised of simple white geometric forms arranged around a central courtyard.
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The courtyard not only brings northern light into the living area, but also provides the entry to the house, accessed via a bamboo-lined external side walkway. Glazing wraps around the courtyard, with an outdoor shower set among the plantings alongside the fence. Behind the courtyard, the living, kitchen and dining area is beautiful in its seeming simplicity, but it is also a highly considered composition of materials and forms. A lofty 6.1-metre glazed wall fills the living area with sunlight, accentuating the texture and shadow of the white brick wall. A raked ceiling and gentle curves subtly guide movement and light deeper into the room as it becomes the kitchen and dining area. A concrete step morphs into a fireplace plinth, shelving and cupboards transition into cabinetry and benchtop, and a still-high three-metre ceiling creates a more intimate sense of space. Minimalist glass doors open the space to a narrow side garden and rear deck, stacking on the exterior of the house. Akin Atelier knew that the choice of glazing would significantly influence the experience and function of the house, and project architect Georgia McGowan undertook lengthy research and analysis of different window systems, glazed panel sizes and cost comparisons. The designers prioritized slim-profile windows for the most important openings
NEW HOUSE
01 Screens of rosewood timber, left to grey with age in Bondi’s coastal conditions, give natural colour to the home’s exterior. 02 A glazed wall washes the living area in northern light and casts textured shadows onto the adjoining white brick wall. 03 The living area’s shelves and cupboards make a nimble transition to kitchen cabinets and a benchtop.
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to maximize natural light and the indoor–outdoor connection, and standard profiles on the side elevation for cost-effectiveness. “The way the doors open up and disappear allows for an extension of the living space and the minimalism of the system contributes to how the space is experienced,” Georgia says. A flush floor finish and a fine-edged steel track enhance the uninterrupted sense of space, with a slim circular column in the corner modestly supporting the upstairs volume. This attention to apertures continues throughout the house. Glass doors in the front room (an adaptable guest bedroom, study or family room) similarly pocket into a wall, out of view. A round window in the bathroom pivots on its horizontal axis and pierces the rectilinearity of the front facade. A skylight extends the length of the staircase, offering views of the sky, and slim-profile windows open upstairs to the courtyard. The second-floor plan takes guests and future children into account, with two bedrooms and a bathroom at the front and the main bedroom and ensuite at the back. The passageway provides a threshold between the two and each can be closed off to create contained private spaces. The clients’ bedroom, bathroom and walk-in robe are arranged around this passage to create a seamlessness of space. Timber wardrobes extend along one wall, divided by the vanity, which sits across the hall from the wet areas. A skylight bathes the shower in natural light, and timber screens and the neighbour’s bamboo trees create a sanctuary-like atmosphere. The bedroom is also a quiet, calm retreat, with plants that cascade over the edge of the roof below and sliding timber screens provide privacy from the neighbouring apartment blocks. The design team gave these operable screens thorough attention as another aperture of the house, and the rosewood timber, left to grey, brings natural colour and texture to the exterior. The skylights, likewise, have been elevated above ceiling height to create light and shadow effects as sunlight scatters through the openings. Throughout Cloud House, the junctions and openings create a continuous and effortless sense of space as windows, doors and screens seemingly disappear. “This house is about simplicity,” says Kelvin. “You don’t notice when you walk into a space, but you feel it.”
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3 259 m² 190 m²
Design 9 m Build 1y
Products Roofing: Lysaght Klip-lok in Colorbond ‘Windspray’ External walls: Textured render in Dulux ‘Vivid White’; custom rosewood privacy screens by the builder Internal walls: Paint in Dulux ‘Vivid White’; lightly bagged brick seconds feature wall Windows: Vitrocsa VA Mono aluminium windows in Dulux ‘Zeus Black’; Central Coast Shopfronts sliding aluminium windows in Dulux ‘Zeus Black’ Doors: Vitrocsa VA Mono aluminium glazed sliding doors; tallowwood entry door in matt polyurethane; In-teria ‘Big O’ tallowwood door handle in clear matt exterior-grade oil finish Flooring: Nash Timbers tallowwood hardwood flooring in matt finish Lighting: Ay Illuminate Bamboo M1 Pendant in ‘Natural’ from Spence and Lyda; Flos Glo-Ball from Euroluce Kitchen: Honed Carrara marble benchtops from Granite and Marble Works; 2-pac polyurethane joinery in Dulux ‘Vivid White’; Brodware City Stik tap from Candana Bathroom: Kaldewei bathtub from Candana; Brodware City Stik tapware; Bisanna Carrarra matt white tiles Heating and cooling: Daikin bulkhead air conditioning units; Lopi linear gas fireplace with custom surround External elements: Eco Outdoor Crazy Paving in ‘Endicott’; rosewood decking, natural finish Other: Jardan lounge, dining table and coffee table; Thonet Hoffman chairs; Henry Wilson lamp; Armadillo and Co rug; Artek stools from Anibou; custom concrete plinth by Concrete Bespoke
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Behind the courtyard, the living, kitchen and dining area is beautiful in its seeming simplicity, but it is also a highly considered composition of materials and forms.
06 Minimalist glass doors and operable timber screens open the interior spaces to the garden. 07 The central courtyard provides the entry to the house, accessed via a bamboo-lined external walkway.
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Project team: Kelvin Ho, Georgia McGowan, Linda Tjaturono Builder: Robert Plumb Build Engineer: Partridge Landscape designer: Dangar Barin Smith
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Lambert & Fils
For Samuel Lambert of Montreal-based studio Lambert et Fils, a change of career led him to lighting design. Today, he creates lights that are part utilitarian and part art installation.
LIGHTING DESIGN
Words by Colin Martin
Samuel Lambert founded his design studio in 2010 when, having previously worked in visual arts and film editing, he changed direction and started designing lights. Samuel was inspired by the example set by his father, a potter who designed and made tableware and sculptural ceramics. Samuel's studio, Lambert et Fils, comprises fifty people, including five designers and a skilled team of fabricators. Lambert et Fils ceiling, wall, table and floor lamps are designed and hand-assembled in Montreal. They are then exported to distributors in Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Living Edge in Australia. “That’s partly why we focus on lighting and make our own products,” says Samuel. “Furniture is too bulky and heavy to ship globally and by fabricating it ourselves we can guarantee the quality of our products more easily.” The main design features of Samuel’s Waldorf collection are its combination of open hemispherical shades with cylindrical socket covers (in the suspended and wall-mounted configurations) and its use of swivelling shades and other moving parts to provide functional flexibility. The Laurent collection, meanwhile, “distils the milk globe to its essential relationship, between circle and sphere.” It features thin forms that carve through space, complementing the globes and moving between line, surface and volume. The studio also collaborates with other designers, including SSSVLL in Montreal, for the Mile collection, and
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SCMP Design Office in Paris for the Dorval collection. Part lighting solution and part art installation, Mile is an asymmetric linear lamp that appears weightless, almost levitating. Direct and indirect LED lights are separated via a ninety-degree pivot. Launched at a Belgian design fair in October 2018, the Dorval collection has a contemporary industrial vibe, evoking airport runway beacons or, more sinisterly, surveillance cameras. “People take time to ‘read’ its form,” says Samuel who, intrigued when he first saw the SCMP pendant prototype during Paris Design Week in 2017, negotiated a collaboration and reconfigured its design for production. Lambert’s historic design heroes include German silversmith and designer Christian Dell, who was foreman of the Bauhaus metal workshop from 1922 to 1925 and later designed lights, notably the Luxus table lamp (1936); and Charles and Ray Eames, whose house and studio he visited recently. Designing products other than lighting hasn’t been ruled out by Samuel, as evidenced by the studio’s enlightened creative initiative, Lab, which is open to all employees. It aims to explore materials, including concrete, leather and paper, to discover new personal forms of artistic expression and novel production methods. Fittingly, Samuel’s Lab reprises pioneering teaching methods used at the Bauhaus in that school’s centenary year. lambertetfils.com
STUDIO
01 Designed with SCMP Design Office, the Dorval collection evokes airport runway beacons. 02 The Waldorf collection features swivelling shades and other moving parts. 03 Samuel Lambert, founder of Lambert et Fils. 04 The Mile collection was made in collaboration with SSSVLL. 05 The Laurent collection explores the relationship between circle and sphere.
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Brilliant ideas for Kitchens & Bathrooms
Don’t miss out. New issue released in June. Pre-order your print copy at architecturemedia.com/store
Kitchen: Downie North Architects Photography: Felipe Neves
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Rinse & repeat
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Showers reminiscent of Art Deco microphones, LED-illuminated mirrors and Moroccan-inspired ceramic fixtures – the products featured here bring a sense of movement and fun to the bathroom. Find more residential products: selector.com and productnews.com.au
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01 Polar Space tiles The Polar Space series from Everstone is a collection of ceramic wall tiles in a wide range of colours and shapes. Colours include ‘Polar White,’ ‘Polar Grey Blue’ and ‘Polar Black’ while formats range from rectangular to herringbone, scallop and hexagon mosaic. everstone.com.au
03 HV1 basin mixer Originally designed in the 1960s by Danish architect Arne Jacobsen, Vola’s HV1 basin mixer is now available in eighteen hues, ranging from understated brushed stainless steel to vibrant yellow. The mixer is crafted from quality solid brass with some components in stainless steel. vola.com
02 Constellation accessories Designed by Studiopepe for Agape, Constellation is a range of elegant countertop mirrors, containers and bathroom accessories. Made to appear as if they were shaped by water, the pieces are made from polished Bianco Carrara or Nero Marquina marble. artedomus.com
04 Newform Libera kitchen mixer Newform Libera from Parisi is a dual-spray mixer with a unique, anti-fingerprint finish. It is available in six satin and gloss metal finishes, including ‘Copper Satin’ (pictured) and with a range of hose colours. Made in Italy, Newform Libera embodies striking and crisp styling. parisi.com.au
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PRODUCTS
05 Bocchi Mandalina collection The Bocchi Mandalina bathroom collection from Paco Jaansōn was inspired by the bold colours and textures found in Moroccan design. Featuring a ceramic countertop basin and accompanying toilet, the collection encapsulates the earthy colours of Marrakech. pacojaanson.com.au
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06 Components tapware Components by Kohler is collection of interchangeable tapware elements that have been “designed to be designed.” By combining different components – handle, spout and finish – a unique look can be created to resonate with the architecture of a specific space. kohler.com.au
08 Oliver vanity Highgrove Bathrooms has expanded its vanity collection with the launch of the Oliver wall-hung vanity in ‘Forest Green’ and ‘Deep Blue.’ With its subtle indenting and interchangeable handles and top, Oliver is designed to elevate any bathroom. highgrovebathrooms.com.au
07 Cyprus Stonex shower floor The Cyprus Stonex shower floor by Roca features a contemporary textured surface with an organic and natural feel. Durable, functional and aesthetically pleasing, the Stonex material offers an alternative to polymarble or acrylic. It is available in four different finishes and sizes. roca.com.au
09 Grate and drain finishes Stormtech’s new ‘Brass,’ ‘Copper,’ ‘Bronze’ and ‘Matte Black’ finishes for drainage systems offer creative options to designers. The finishes are available across Stormtech’s entire range of grates and drains and can give a sleek and luminous finish to any contemporary design. stormtech.com.au
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PRODUCTS
10 Aio twin shower Methven’s Aio twin shower is now available in matt black. Ideal for use in conjunction with natural materials, including timber and stone, the new colour was conceived to suit modern bathroom designs. The sculptural Aio shower is highly efficient and delivers a luxurious fan-like spray. methven.com
ARCHITECTURAL GRATES + DRAINS
Architectural lines. The ďŹ nest linear grate selection from the people who invented them. Stormtech grates and drainage systems draw a perfect line connecting unmatched durability, superb craftsmanship and world class design. Give your bathroom or kitchen the best grate selection available, or create contemporary transitions from indoors to outdoors with our seamless threshold range. Designed and manufactured in Australia from marine grade stainless steel, Stormtech remains the gold standard for design and sustainability with full Greentag certiďŹ cation.
Bathrooms
Showers
Pools + Surrounds Thresholds
Doortracks
Special Needs Access
View our complete selection on the Stormtech website, and match the perfect drain to your design needs.
Visit us at stormtech.com.au for tools + inspiration.
Telephone 1300 653 403
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11 Sól collection Drawing inspiration from the goddess of the sun in Norse mythology, the Sól collection from Apaiser includes a bath, conical and elliptic basins, and a stool. With its tailored detail and elegant lines, the collection brings a sense of luxury into the bathroom. apaiser.com
13 Eccentric shower collection Reminiscent of Art Deco microphones, the Eccentric collection by Rogerseller features distinct elongated perforations, which deliver a generous yet soft downpour. Made from machined solid brass and stainless steel, Eccentric is designed and engineered to last. rogerseller.com.au
12 XSquare bathroom furniture Duravit’s XSquare bathroom furniture range combines wooden surfaces with a striking chrome profile that frames the cabinets and vanity units. Comprising floor-standing and wall-mounted units, the collection comes in a wide range of sizes and finishes. duravit.com
14 Otis backlit mirrors The Otis collection by Remer features mirrors that are illuminated by an array of LEDs. The backlighting gives the mirrors a soft ambience and a sense of depth. With an in-built touch switch and demister, an Otis mirror brings both functionality and style to the bathroom. remer.com.au
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PRODUCTS
15 Ortho wall-mounted mixer Phoenix Tapware’s Ortho is a minimalist wall-mounted mixer with a geometric form defined by right angles. It features a graphic central dial that offers intuitive control over flow and temperature to reduce energy consumption. phoenixtapware.com.au
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Panov Scott Architects IN PROFILE
Armed with a finely crafted material palette that evokes memory and invites patina, Sydney practice Panov Scott Architects creates thoughtful architecture that embraces people and the pattern of the city. Words by Peter Salhani Photography by Brett Boardman
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A grassroots revolution is happening in architecture – a move away from the “starchitect” model of showpieces and toward a more thoughtful approach that embraces people and landscape as central, not incidental. Sydney’s Panov Scott Architects is part of the movement. Directors Anita Panov and Andrew Scott live and work in a terrace house in Sydney’s Paddington, a light- and plant-filled space that they share with their two young sons and (Monday to Friday) three colleagues. In the front two rooms, communal tables are flanked by bookshelves ceiling high. The serenity of the space reflects the growing body of “transformations” by the practice, which was awarded the Emerging Architect Prize in the Australian Institute of Architects’ 2016 NSW Architecture Awards. For Anita and Andrew, home and studio are their centre of gravity and a collaborative place for creating and learning. The couple met while studying architecture at the University of Newcastle. On an exchange trip to Brussels,
they realized that travel, and each other, would be lifelong teachers and companions. In different ways, their childhoods had taught them to live frugally, to work hard and ask simple but profound questions such as, “What is a house,” and “How little do we need to live well?” “An idea we latched onto early was something Cicero said: A house is like a library and a garden, and when you have a library and a garden, you have all you need,” explains Anita. “That’s what we’ve always aspired to in how we live, and how we design for other people. [Living] smaller is the other thing – we all need less than we think.” Anita and Andrew served their apprenticeships at larger, lauded firms (she with Smart Design Studio and he with Candalepas Associates) before founding Panov Scott in 2012 with three golden rules. “One: Projects have to be a place for our client to live/work/be – transformations, not speculations. Two: We stay involved from start to finish. Three: Our clients are good people; you go on quite a journey together.”
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01 Andrew Scott and Anita Panov, directors of Panov Scott Architects. 02 At Armature for a Window (2012), a vertically sliding glass wall opens the house to the garden.
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03 For Armature for a Window, Andrew and Anita were inspired by timber dwellings seen during a trip to Kyoto.
04 The practice’s first project, Armature for a Window, was used as a testing ground for new ideas.
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05 From Monday to Friday, Andrew and Anita share their home with their colleagues, turning their terrace house in Sydney’s Paddington into their architecture studio. 06 Three by Two House (2014) in Sydney’s inner west is framed with a chequerboard of six window panels in timber or glass. 07 Instead of creating a dedicated lounge at Three by Two House, the architects activated the thresholds; an alcove window now looks onto a courtyard.
With each transformation, Panov Scott breathes ethereal light into dark corners and connects even the most incidental of spaces joyously to a garden. Key to each has been the window – which, in Panov Scott’s architecture, is heroic. Each project idiosyncratically uses thresholds between inside and out to expand the ways of living in a house. Their first project, Armature for a Window, was Andrew and Anita’s own semi-detached terrace house, a testing ground for ideas and for how they might work together in practice. A small sash window in the front room inspired the vast, vertically sliding glass wall that opens the rear of the house to the garden. “As we sat beside it for months, talking and planning, that small window took on mythical proportions. Its action and detail became synonymous with light and air. The house itself little more than an armature,” explains Andrew. In Three by Two House (see Houses 96), a semidetached dwelling in Sydney’s inner west, a small opening twists skyward at the nexus of the retained original and reconfigured sections. This allows light down into the centre of the long plan, where it washes over a splayed plywood panel signalling a brighter room beyond. The room expands in height to six metres, framed with a chequerboard of six window panels in timber or glass. Instead of creating a dedicated lounge, the architects activated the threshold edges
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With each transformation, Panov Scott breathes ethereal light into dark corners and connects even the most incidental of spaces joyously to a garden.
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08 In Sydney’s inner east, Bolt Hole (2018) skirts the perimeter of a 120-square-metre site. Photograph: Murray Fredericks. 09 The arrival to Bolt Hole is at the central courtyard where a Japanese maple tree thrives. Photograph: Murray Fredericks. 10 The kitchen and living rooms of Bolt Hole were moved to the laneway edge and pivot around the central light well and courtyard. Photograph: Murray Fredericks.
of the communal dining and kitchen with dual-purpose elements: an east-facing alcove window looking into a tiny courtyard, and an elongated concrete stair landing that doubles as a sunlit platform for play. So if you lose the “lounge room,” how do you define a house? “We taught a design studio (at the University of Technology, Sydney) on that very question,” says Andrew. “You reduce down to the core functions required of a home – a place to sleep, a washbasin, a kitchen, somewhere to read – and build an idea of domestic environments through these small human actions and armatures.” Bolt Hole, in Sydney’s inner east, turns a twobedroom cottage into a courtyard house, with no increase in size. On a site of just 120 square metres, Panov Scott pushed the built form to the perimeter, externalizing the core of the house as a central light well and courtyard, around which pivots seventy-five square metres of internal space. Services, storage and a study are sleeved into the perimeter. Bedrooms and the bathroom were moved from the front to the private rear, while the kitchen and living rooms were moved up to the laneway edge. Entry is from the centre, so arrival is at the courtyard, where a Japanese maple tree thrives and the old fireplace is restored as a relic. “If a house can have a centre of gravity, here it is the garden court – a small, intensely planned space that brings amenity and delight to every room,” Anita says. Socially, however, the hub is the kitchen, where it’s possible to engage with the lane, the courtyard and each of the private interior spaces. Jac House (see Houses 115), in Sydney’s inner west, celebrates the seasons in a love letter to a jacaranda tree.
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Between a Federation cottage and the older, sculptural tree, Panov Scott inserted a new volume, open to the garden at ground level, with a second storey sweeping up toward the tree’s outstretched limbs. “Our transformation mediates. It’s literally neither open nor closed, not dark, or so bright. At each moment in time, a part of the house is optimally refined for the hour, the season, or the mood,” explains Andrew. Their material palette is finely crafted, evoking memory, inviting patina. Silvering timbers, recycled bricks, liquid concrete descending stairs and wrapping up walls to mark a datum. Sometimes a single material anchors a project, like Armature’s gently ageing, coved cedar frames, inspired by the traditional timber houses of Kyoto, or Bolt Hole’s black-speckled sandstock bricks – a thrilling contrast to the interior’s precision. In 2017 the pair held A Small Exhibition in Sydney, gathering twenty projects by like-minded local practices, each
bringing radical new amenity to homes on a tiny footprint. “We curated the exhibition as a body of research on small housing,” says Anita. “From that came an invitation [by New South Wales Department of Planning and Environment] to work on a state-wide small housing design guide.” Other public projects have followed, including the revitalization of the Museum of the Riverina in Wagga Wagga and the renewal of the community centre and change rooms for Bronte Ocean Pool Swim Clubs in Sydney’s east. Is it difficult moving between small-scale transformations and public projects? “The design thinking required of small projects is transferable from the private to the public domain,” says Andrew. “We are, after all, making spaces for people. Architecture is background, not foreground, or as architect Florian Beigel said: it’s the rug, not the picnic.” Cicero might approve the metaphor. panovscott.com.au
11 Jac House (2017) celebrates the seasons in a love letter to a jacaranda tree. 12 For Jac House, Panov Scott inserted a new volume that is open to the garden at ground level, with a second storey sweeping up toward the tree’s outstretched limbs.
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Zigzag Cabin by Drew Heath
Acting as a “billboard in the bush” for architecture, this colourful cabin that was completed almost twenty years ago, was a first foray into the design-build process for architect Drew Heath.
FIRST HOUSE
Words by Drew Heath Photography by Brett Boardman
Zigzag Cabin (see Architecture Australia July/August 2003) brings together many of my ideas about architecture, which began to take shape in my early days of practice – everything custom built and designed with a timber and hardware store palette. The style has “Australian bush shack” and “tiny Japanese house” all over it. I started practising in my late twenties on a couple of small buildings and some alteration and addition projects, and Zigzag Cabin was an exciting freestanding project to take on. We had a good site, good brief and good client. Located in the New South Wales Hunter Region’s Wollombi, about 130 kilometres north of Sydney, the site was way, way out there. Since this project I can’t count the number of times I’ve gone to visit a site like this, that’s down a dirt road, down another dirt road and then up a hill on a dirt road. You find yourself standing there wondering, “How did I end up here?” Zigzag Cabin was intended to be the base camp for a future house. Richard Leplastrier, now a professor in the University of Newcastle’s School of Architecture and the Built Environment, had taught me as a student to get to know the site, camp there, live there – and here was an opportunity to do so. The sketch design, as is the case for most of my projects, was done on the back of a beer coaster – literally. The “arty” clients rejected the first sketch so I came back with something a little more out there: a tiny, colourful, cubist box with a deck for living. I can’t remember exactly where the name for the house came from, but it references the dwelling’s zigzagging facade of vertical and horizontal windows, framing bush views. The building process was unusual, to say the least. I was determined to “touch the earth lightly,” so we carried everything to the site, up a hill and on a tiny path, by hand. We also worked without power, so everything was precut or cut on site with hand tools. This resulted in details such as the use of masonite, fibre cement sheeting and cover strips, all cut to fit on site. Of course, it was self-engineered;
01 Located in remote bushland, Zigzag Cabin was a “labour of love” for Drew Heath, who spent many nights camping alone at the site. 02 With his first proposal rejected by his clients, Drew young designer looked to cubism for design inspiration.
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03 A series of platforms organizes the space inside the cabin to accommodate seating, sleeping and storage. 04 Built by hand on site, the cabin was constructed from hardy, readily available materials. 05 The zigzagging windows run parallel to nooks for repose, focusing views to the landscape.
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The building process was unusual, to say the least. I was determined to “touch the earth lightly,” so we carried everything to the site, up a hill and on a tiny path, by hand.
the footings are made from lumps of rock from the site and a few bags of concrete mix. The cabin was built while we were also building projects in Sydney and Gloucester, so we would often swing by those on the way, scavenging materials from either site. It ended up being camp-on-theground stuff, draping paper or plastic over yourself at night to protect from rain and dew. Completing the cabin became a labour of love, stretched out over a year spent coming and going, and I found myself finishing it alone for a period. I realized how good the project could be for my career so I stuck with it. I’m sure I spent more time on site than the clients, who had young kids. They were a little freaked out by the remoteness of the site and sold it soon after completion. I saw the project as a “billboard in the bush” for architecture and my career. I knew it was very graphic in its colourful, cubist form and that it would photograph well. Photographer Brett Boardman, as ever, had one of those days where he just nailed it – bushfire smoke in the distance keeping us on our toes and giving us a great orange sky. As is often the case, you get the work you publish. Zigzag Cabin was published a lot. I’ve ended up with years of requests for Zigzag Cabins. It’s almost twenty years old and I’m still getting calls in reference to it. Sure, I wish I’d published a multi-million-dollar project instead and had requests for big houses coming in every month, but I didn’t. I know it has made my career more difficult financially, as small projects don’t tend to add up in fees and service. But you have to start somewhere and I am still interested in the design of small living spaces and the processes of living and building in extreme conditions. I’m currently working on a couple of small, remote buildings and I couldn’t be happier.
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Architect Drew Heath Architects +61 414 491 270 drew@drewheatharchitect.com drewheatharchitect.com
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Project team: Drew Heath Builders: Drew Heath, Shaun Barnett, Craig Morrison
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A request for increased amenity rather than more square metres was the impetus behind this deceptively compact addition to a period Hobart home, where shifts in level and volume help create light-filled spaces and a connection to the garden.
Words by Judith Abell Photography by Adam Gibson
The brief for this extension, located on the edge of Hobart’s city centre, was to bring in more light, connect the home to the garden and thereby make the communal spaces much more liveable. The owners of the conjoined early-twentieth-century terrace did not want a significantly bigger home, instead they wanted better amenity. Preston Lane Architects has answered the two-part brief in this extension with a range of new light sources for the home, an increased perception of space through the manipulation of volume and level changes to create an easy transition between inside and out. The clients work in shift-based healthcare roles. As a result, they experience their house at all times of the day and night as they prepare for or relax after work. While many people would want to increase the amount of sunlight entering their home, perhaps shift work increases the desire for the warmth, prospect and variability that light can bring. While the existing house had considerable character, including an original stained-glass door, lights and timber stair, it was dark and a little pokey, with much of the precious northern wall space at the garden end of the home taken up by a laundry and bathroom. The clients appealed to Preston Lane to rethink the arrangement of the main living and service rooms, and to open it to the sun while maintaining privacy from a neighbour located across a narrow right of way.
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01 A glazed “snorkel,” formed from the steeply vaulted ceiling, floods the kitchen and dining space with sunlight.
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Programmatically, the new work only adds on the floor area of one room. This new space merges with the end room of the existing house, opening up to form an open-plan, two-level space with a stepped transition between. The lounge room sits on the higher level, while the new dining and kitchen sit half a metre lower, closer to the natural ground line of the garden. The bathroom shares the end wall of the main bedroom and an ensuite has been added beside it. These wet spaces are small but efficient, with one borrowing light from the other. The laundry has been spliced into the wall joinery, which runs the full length of the southern party wall, becoming kitchen cupboards on the lower level. A large slider conceals a washer, dryer and cupboard space, which the clients love as it allows them to deal with this daily task while remaining part of the life of the house. The unique qualities of this extension come through in the play with volume. A flat ceiling above the lounge area stretches into a deep vault above the dining room. The architects refer to this as a “snorkel,” bringing direct and bounced sunlight into this area of the home. With the floor dropping away and the ceiling rising up to this sky-lit feature, there is a perception that the living space is larger than its modest plan area. A large north-facing window and a glazed pivot door add to the wash of light in the room. Operable blades on part of the northern glazing allow the light in without forgoing privacy for the occupants. In addition, a slice of the flat lounge ceiling is a new skylight, which offers views to the clouds for those lying on the couch, while subtly indicating the line between the existing house and the new work. Materials, colours and detail are stripped back and neutral, but each selection has a function beyond aesthetics. The duck-egg blue wall that wraps the bathrooms offers a subtle nod to the existing panelling of the home, with its vertical V-joint. Its curves and angles serve to define the entrance to this part of the house, work around existing features and offer an interesting surface for light to play across. The vertical detailing is continued in the kitchen, where custom pulls run the full height of the joinery doors. The timber floor of the existing house gives way to a burnished concrete slab at the lower level, in the area that receives the most light and warmth, thereby activating the thermal properties of this material. Solid timber joinery offers colour and warmth for open shelving where the occupants can place objects that reflect their aesthetic personality. Recycled bricks – the clients cleaned 2,500 of them for the project – have been used in a series of steps that transition from the back door into the garden. The clients’ simple wish for more light has been the making of this extended house, with vaulting, detailing and material selection offering a series of surfaces that highlight changes in light throughout the day. The clients excitedly note that the new spaces have already accommodated a thirty-fiveperson Christmas lunch and crash testing from friends’ kids, but it is their delight in noticing the way that light bounces around the home and their newfound enjoyment of the garden that make the clients feel very much at home.
HOUSES 127
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Products Roofing: Lysaght Custom Orb and Klip-lok in Colorbond ‘Monument’ External walls: Vertical cladding in Dulux ‘Casper White’; existing weatherboard in Dulux ‘Metalise’ Internal walls: Easycraft Easygroove wall panelling in Dulux ‘Calandre’; brickwork and plasterboard in Dulux ‘Natural White’ Windows: Capral glazing channel and 325 Narrowline Double Glazed System; Velux FS Fixed Skylight; Viridian narrow fluted glass Doors: Custom Tasmanian oak door frames in clear satin finish; Designer Doorware Neo Blade Pull in black powdercoat; August Smart Lock Pro in ‘Dark Grey’; Centor sliding door tracks; Lockwood pivot system Flooring: Tasmanian oak floorboards in clear satin finish; burnished concrete floor Lighting: Philips Hue Cher suspension light; Lucide Tube spotlight; Geoffrey Cameron Marshall SV Demi Conus pendant light Kitchen: Fisher and Paykel pyrolitic oven, cooktop, integrated dishwasher and fridge; AEG integrated rangehood; Phoenix Vivid Slimline tap in ‘Gun Metal’; Essastone by Laminex benchtop in ‘Crystalite’ gloss finish; Laminex joinery in ‘White’; Easycraft Easygroove wall panelling in Dulux ‘Natural White’ Bathroom: Tasmanian oak veneer joinery; Essastone by Laminex benchtops in ‘Crystallite’ gloss finish External elements: Salvaged bricks from existing house Heating and cooling: Airsmart ducted airconditioning Other: Custom aluminium external louvres
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02 Operable blades allow sun from the north to penetrate the house while also providing privacy.
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03 Aligned with a shift in floor level, a narrow skylight marks the point at which the addition and existing house adjoin. Artwork: Jai Vasicek. 04 Echoing the character of the surrounding context, reclaimed brick stairs connect the home to the garden.
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Architect Preston Lane Architects +61 3 6231 2923 hob@prestonlane.com.au prestonlane.com.au
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Project team: Daniel Lane, Rachel Englund, Nathanael Preston Builder: Langford Projects Engineer: Aldanmark Consulting Engineers Building surveyor: Pitt and Sherry Interior stylist: This Vacant Space
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This characterful addition to a beach shack in a former coal mining village in New South Wales speaks to its historical narrative and neighbouring ancient landform.
Words by Rebecca Gross Photography by Katherine Lu
Coledale, north of Wollongong, is a small seaside town and historic coal mining village that occupies a narrow stretch of land between the Illawarra Escarpment and the Tasman Sea. Prior to more recent development, the town’s houses were predominantly fishermen and miners’ shacks and holiday cottages – “small, singlestorey, cobbled together and home built,” says Morgen Figgis, who co-founded Barnacle Studio with Mignon Steele. As the area has become more urbanized, the older houses have been renovated or rebuilt, and often doubled in height and footprint. “The expectation of what people want in their homes is now incompatible with the old building stock here,” Morgen explains. Piz House – named after its owners, Pete and Isabel – represents a conscious departure from this norm. The couple, who have two young children, purchased the original two-bedroom cottage as a means to downsize. They wanted a more contained home, to live with less and to have the natural environment at their doorstep. The fact that very little had been done to the cottage was also of great appeal; one room, like a “caravan annex,” had been added and the porch closed in. Pete and Isabel engaged long-time friends Morgen and Mignon, to refresh the cottage and to create a north-facing, front extension that would address the landscape and the street.
HOUSES 127
The addition houses a sunroom, kitchen and dining area. Formally, it’s simple: a skillion-roofed rectangular volume that projects outward from the cottage, hovering above the land (and the nascent garden). “It’s like a ship and the garden will become like the sea,” says Morgen. He had imagined the former owner – a “real character” in Coledale – as a sailor, who would watch the fishing boats come in. “In some way you make up a narrative that allows you to get into the creative process,” Morgen says. Constructed with prefabricated wall and roof panels, the addition is positioned on the eastern side of the property for views of the steep escarpment to the north-west. Windows slice through the building and rise to a peak in its northernmost corner, mimicking the shape of the landform, the pitch of the roof and the slope of the street. A fibreglass awning, propped on angled poles, extends above the windows and also lifts in the corner to accentuate the building’s form and composition. The striking fenestration is both functional and decorative. Operable windows are placed high and low for ventilation; painted timber panels and patterned glass provide variation and privacy; and larger fixed windows offer views of the distance rather than foreground. Louvre windows on the east and west allow for cross ventilation and a large sliding glass door opens the room to the deck and courtyard.
ALTERATION + ADDITION
01 Rather than demolish the original cottage, the designers and their clients opted to refresh it with an extension that addresses the street and landscape. 02 Functional and decorative windows rise to a peak, mimicking the shape of the steep escarpment to the north-west. 03 A triangular motif occurs in details throughout the extension, which houses a sunroom, kitchen and dining area. Artwork: Mignon Steele.
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Products Roofing: Lysaght Custom Orb in Colorbond ‘Wallaby’ External walls: Cypress double-log weatherboard cladding in Resene Lustacryl Internal walls: Plasterboard in Resene Zylone Sheen Windows: Spotted gum frames by Ikkyu Joinery in Cutek wood preservative finish Doors: Recycled internal doors in Resene Lustracryl Flooring: Recycled tallowwood in Osmo Polyx oil Kitchen: Custom Joinery by Urban Timber; Big River Armourpanel plywood joinery by Urban Timber; Wisa formply carcass from DMK Forest Products Other: Sunshade fabrication by Graham Davis
Inside, a long sofa sits beneath the northern windows, where it is bathed in natural light, while the raised floor affords it privacy from the street and passers-by. In the same space, a dual-colour tiled splashback mediates the transition between the material palette of the light-filled sunroom and the kitchen’s darker joinery. Triangular details occur as a motif throughout the room and are used as a solution to joinery and lighting elements, including the drawer pulls, shelving and island supports, as well as the vintage pendant above the dining table. The exterior is clad with pale green vertical boards, a subtle variation to the light cream horizontal boards on the original cottage. Mignon selected the colour to highlight the form of the addition, and as a respectful contrast to the landscape. “We didn’t want it to be too eye-catching, but wanted it to be fun and lively,” she says. The same colour scheme continues inside, together with flourishes of coral for a relaxed, beach cottage vibe. Having removed the annex, Morgen and Mignon reconfigured the original house around a central hallway that leads to the backyard from the entry. The compact cottage comfortably accommodates two bedrooms, a family room, studio, bathroom andlaundry. Wide, double-door openings increase the sense of space in each room, as if borrowing from the hallway and adjacent spaces. The interior is an idiosyncratic collection of original, found, recycled, second hand, new and custom-designed pieces. “We were trying to reinvigorate that old character of the beach shack so that it speaks to the historical narrative of the house, but doesn’t get weighed down by it,” says Morgen. Each door is different and the flooring varies throughout: original floorboards, sanded-back parquetry and coralcoloured concrete. “For some people, the different floors would be intolerable,” says Mignon. “We calmed everything else down so that they became the texture to work with.” The effect is quirky and playful yet coherent. It reflects the personality and style of Pete and Isabel, and it is fun and robust for the kids. “It’s a nice case study in how to deal with a small, old shack without having to knock it down,” Morgen says. “And the addition makes a positive contribution to the built environment and community.”
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Designer Barnacle Studio +61 417 280 163 morgen@barnaclestudio.com.au barnaclestudio.com.au
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Taking a neighbourly approach to design and construction, this addition to one in a pair of historic attached cottages in beachside Sydney preserves a connection to Australia’s coast-dwelling past.
Words by Sing d’Arcy Photography by Tom Ferguson
All buildings have a story to tell: the story of the lives of the people that have interacted with them and the story of their place. Archisoul Architects was entrusted with reimagining and restoring two unassuming timber-clad cottages in Manly that occupy a unique place in the area’s history and in the story of Australia’s beach culture. In the last decade of the nineteenth century, the Sly brothers, a couple of local fishermen, built the pair of semi-detached cottages, which sit close to Manly beach. From the rear of these houses they would take their boat to the nearby beaches and patrol the waters, in what some historians see as the establishment of surf lifesaving in Australia. With a story such as this that goes to the heart of Australian beach culture, there is little wonder these two humble cottages were deemed to be of high heritage value. In addition to the heritage importance, the project also dealt with an unusual, but effective, client arrangement that generated almost as many stories as the building’s past. One of the owners of the cottages asked Archisoul to take on the renovations. After initial contact with the council, it was recommended that both cottages should be tackled as one project. This was not as easy as it sounds, as the owner of the adjoining cottage lived 16,000 kilometres away in continental Europe. Nonetheless, when contacted, the jetsetting neighbour was more than happy to collaborate in the rebuilding of the cottages and the result is an Australian beachside home in the spirit of European sophistication and comfort.
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01 A mixed palette of textured surfaces bounce diffused light throughout the new cottage interior.
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The first challenge the architects faced was the variance in the briefs, budgets and timeframes of the two separate clients. While the fronts of the cottages were given the same aesthetic treatment, that’s where the similarities ended. Jo Gillies, principal and director of Archisoul, says the project was “two different houses that share a common wall.” There were complex negotiations between the design team and the two clients in order to agree on an aesthetic strategy for the common aspects of the project. A strong juxtaposition between the old and new was used as a way of “honouring the past and defining the new,” and this is no more evident than in the southern cottage, where its small site and long, south-facing facade called for some clever architectural interventions to overcome the limitations. The first tactic was to retain and reuse as much heritage material as possible in the existing cottage. All the timber floors were retained, and timber wall panelling was restored along with the ornate pressed metal ceilings. A clear delineation between the existing cottage and the new addition is made with sand-coloured polished concrete flooring. This, along with the warm tones of the plywood ceiling, give the space a beach-like feel. Bricks reused from a demolished chimney extend the original ground-floor fireplace to the first floor, connecting the two levels and offering a textural feature in the new living space, which is otherwise smooth and slick. Over the dining area, a glass ceiling forms the floor of the upstairs study and allows light to pour into the downstairs space. Far from being dark and pokey, the central section of the house is dramatic and open. The client wanted people to “look up” when they entered the new section of the house and the glass connection allows for this to happen. The kitchen island acts as a mediating device between the dining area and the living area, which connects out to the back courtyard. The whole of the ground floor can be opened up or screened off, and the polished concrete floors have in-slab heating, ensuring year-round comfort and flexibility. In general, the colour palette is conceived as “timeless and flexible” – nuanced neutrals of white and sand are contrasted with black, grey and brass accents. Despite the proximity to the neighbours and the southerly aspect, the upstairs rooms are light-filled and private. Screening devices and windows have been carefully positioned to maximize light and minimize overlooking. The soft palette is continued on the upper levels, with oak flooring in the bedrooms and plywood ceilings. Clerestory windows from the internal bathrooms borrow light from the glazed study space, ensuring that they too are well lit from multiple directions. This project by Archisoul is an interesting lesson in collaboration. Skill and experience have delivered satisfaction to both clients and their differing needs, as well as allowing for these heritage structures to accumulate the stories of a new generation of occupants.
HOUSES 127
ALTERATION + ADDITION
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195 m² 164 m²
Design 1 y 9 m Build 1 y 5 m
Products Roofing: Lysaght Klip-lok and Custom Orb in Colorbond ‘Monument’ External walls: Nu-Wall aluminium cladding in Dulux Duratec ‘Zeus Monument’ Windows: Architectural Window Systems Elevate double-glazed windows in Dulux Duratec ‘Zeus Monument’; Steel Windows Australia double glazed windows in Dulux Duratec ‘Zeus Monument’; Velux double-glazed skylights from Atlite; Halliday Baillie window hardware in ‘Matt Black Chrome’ Doors: Vitrocsa double-glazed sliding doors; Centor flyscreens Flooring: Mafi Oak Clear engineered timber in ‘Brushed White Oil’; original Kauri timber; Lumaris T glass walkway from G.James Glass and Aluminium Ceilings: Gunnersens DesignerPly in ‘Limewash’ Lighting: LA Lounge lighting Kitchen: Miele oven, microwave and dishwasher; Bora cooktop and extractor; Leicht cabinetry; Caesarstone benchtops; mirror splashback Bathroom: Tiles from Earp Bros; Hansgrohe tapware; basins and toilets from Rogerseller; custom recycled kauri vanities Heating and cooling: Hydronic slab heating and electric underfloor heating from Devex Systems; Lopi gas fireplace; Vanguard external operable shading External elements: Danpalon roof sheeting; Eco Outdoor Miramar limestone pavers Furniture: Muuto dining table; Lange Production armchairs; MCM House coffee table; Walter Knoll sidetables
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02 Recessed rear windows and doors provide privacy from the neighbouring cottage to the north. 03 Reclaimed bricks from the existing cottage act as a connecting element between levels. 04 A glazed upper floor, large doors and a mirrored splashback make modest proportions appear expansive.
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The result is an Australian beachside home in the spirit of European sophistication and comfort.
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05 Warm plywood ceilings add to the “sandy� palette, in keeping with the beachside location. 06 Original elements have been retained to preserve the period character of the existing house. 07 A change in material signals the line between the heritage cottage and the new living spaces. 08 Design and refurbishment of the neighbouring cottages took place simultaneously.
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Front porch Entry room Bedroom Laundry Kitchen Living
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Architect Archisoul Architects +61 2 9976 5449 info@archisoul.com.au archisoul.com.au
HOUSES 127
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Project team: Jo Gillies, Kirrili Zimmer, Michael Fitzgerald, Russell Rice, Teneil Van Dyck, Katie Riley Builder: Newmark Constructions Engineer: Jones Nicholson Landscape designer: Podology Landscapes Lighting: LA Lounge Lighting Architects Energy consultant: Efficient Living
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COVE HOUSE BY J U ST I N HUMPHREY A R C H I T ECT
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COVE HOUSE
A thoughtful response to its unique setting and climate in the Gold Coast’s Sanctuary Cove, this house embodies principles of subtropical modern architecture to create a textured home for living and entertaining.
Words by Kirsty Volz Photography by Andy Macpherson
Frank Sinatra and Whitney Houston headlined the Ultimate Event at Sanctuary Cove in 1988. The five-day festival heralded the grand opening of the Gold Coast canal estate, which had been ratified under its own legislative act, the Sanctuary Cove Resort Act 1985. Over time, the secure, gated community has, for better or worse, resulted in an enclave of architectural expression. Set amongst all of this, Cove House by Justin Humphrey Architect is a visual delight, poised to make a valuable contribution to its surrounds for many years to come. Director Justin Humphrey worked closely with the client to deliver the distinctive visual identity of Cove House. The client’s previous home had subscribed to the estate’s typical aesthetic and, in engaging Justin, she sought to make a defined departure from that vernacular. The result is a house that speaks to a much broader context, beyond the confines of its gated community. In addition to providing a beautiful home environment for living and entertaining, Cove House embodies a thoughtful response to its unique setting and climate.
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Perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of the site was the need to contend with three outlooking interfaces – one to the canal, another facing an easement for a public path, and the street front – positioning the house very much at centrestage. The covenant required that the facade facing the pathway be built on the boundary and therefore fire rated. Rather than see this as a constraint, Justin used this wall as an opportunity to express the materiality of the house with board-formed concrete, articulated by powdercoated metallic louvres that cleverly assist in naturally ventilating the interior. The home’s street front employs the external cladding materials to communicate its internal functions. The board-formed concrete continues around to express the public areas within the home, while the delicate timber battens proffer contrast and convey the private spaces, such as the bedrooms and bathrooms. Separating these two domains is a central axis that draws visitors inward from the entrance to
NEW HOUSE
01 The home’s street-facing elevation hints at the materiality of the interiors. 02 Small, openroofed courtyard gardens work to visually demarcate circulation paths. Artwork: Frank Hodgkinson. 03 The floating roof ties together the home’s concrete and timber elements and gives lightness to its form.
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the canal. The floating roof, with finely tapered edges, ties all of these elements together and gives lightness to the form. Many of these formal elements are propositions unique to tropical and subtropical modern architecture. A further nod to tropical modernism exists in the sequence of internal gardens and courtyards. The large entry courtyard garden at once fulfils alternate definitions for the homograph “entrance” and performs several functions in the planning of the house, providing for entry to two bedrooms, designed for guests and adult children, and framing a view through the living areas to the water beyond. Smaller, open-roofed courtyard gardens, enclosed by sliding glass doors, work to visually demarcate circulation paths. They are seamlessly integrated into the plan, adding light, texture and acoustic sensations reminiscent of those qualities found in Geoffrey Bawa’s domestic architecture. The gardens are, collectively, a response to the client’s desire to work with honest materials, which extends to the refined materials palette chosen for the interior finishes. Most pronounced of those finishes are the timber battens used for screening and as a continuous element that ties the internal spaces together. When applied to sliding doors, they assist in providing cross-ventilation and passive cooling to the house. Each batten’s concave profile creates a seductive tactility through shadow and depth. The smart detailing evident in the screens represents so much about the project – most significantly, a collaboration between architect, fabricator and builder as a bespoke solution. The internal finishes are also used to zone rooms within the open, public areas of the home. Individual spaces are sculpted using height and volume changes, the arrangement of garden courtyards and changes in ceiling finishes. This approach to creating rooms within the larger volumes encourages flexible inhabitation, from a quiet night in, to a large sprawling party. The capacity to entertain a small crowd was stipulated in the brief and, undoubtedly, Cove House will delight many party guests now and into the future. Sanctuary Cove sits within the booming region of the northern Gold Coast, an area that is a growing hub for family entertainment. Cove House has the potential to play an influential role in defining a unique visual identity for its community, as well as leading the way toward climate- and context-responsive housing in an area of rapid urban growth. This is an important role to be played by architects and one for which Justin Humphrey Architect, and Cove House, can be commended.
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Site Floor
966 m² 470 m²
Products Roofing: Lysaght Trimdek in Colorbond ‘Monument’; Alucoil composite panel in ‘Jet Black’; Australian Timber Ceilings blackbutt soffit lining External walls: Weathertex Ecowall Smooth; Sculptform Click-on battens in Australian blackbutt; off-form concrete, board-formed and smooth Internal and external walls: CSR Gyprock plasterboard Windows: Vanguard external motorized louvres; G. James Glass and Aluminium windows Doors: Alucoil aluminium composite panel garage door in ‘Jet Black’ by J and B Garage Doors Flooring: Endicott crazy paving and Torino bluestone pavers, both from Eco Outdoor; Wildwood Timber Flooring, solid French oak in ‘Smoked Beach Wash’
Design 1 y Build 1 y 6 m
Lighting: Wever and Ducré Ray wall lights; Delta Light Logic wall light; Weplight Paulina pendant from ECC Lighting and Furniture Kitchen: Neff ovens and cooktop; Qasair rangehood; Fisher and Paykel dish drawer; LG fridge and freezer; Eurocave wine cellar conditioner; Beefeater integrated barbecue; Franke Sinos tap; Schock sinks from Abey; Silestone benchtop; Polytec cabinet facing in ‘Black Wenge’ and ‘Natural Oak’ Bathroom: Apaiser bath and basins; Rogerseller Eccentric tapware; Academy Tiles Kit Kat mosaic tiles Heating and cooling: Big Ass Fans Haiku ceiling fans External elements: Blackbutt decking; Endicott crazy paving from Eco Outdoor Other: Ultralift Picasso TV lift; custom aluminium elements by Acrux Aluminium
04 A refined material palette has been chosen for the interior finishes. 05 Timber screens and sliding glass doors provide cross ventilation and passive cooling.
COVE HOUSE
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Garage Covered link Study Garden room Entry Linen Laundry Service court Butlers pantry Kitchen Dining Living Terrace Sunken lounge Pool Main bedroom Walk-in-robe Bedroom
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06 In order to zone rooms within the open areas of the home, individual spaces are sculpted using height and volume changes. 07 The entry’s curved concrete wall hints at the rounded forms found throughout the house. 08 The home’s sequence of internal gardens and courtyards is a nod to tropical modernism.
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Individual spaces are sculpted using height and volume changes, the arrangement of garden courtyards, and changes in ceiling finishes. Architect Justin Humphrey Architect +61 412 833 427 justin@justinhumphreyarchitect.com.au justinhumphreyarchitect.com.au
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NEW HOUSE
Project team: Justin Humphrey Builder: B. J. Millar Constructions Engineer: NGS Structural Engineers Landscape designer: Dan Deshon
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Rosebery House by Andresen O’Gorman
Responding to a ridgeline that runs west across the gully, this Brisbane home designed by Brit Andresen and Peter O’Gorman illustrates the expressive capacity of Australian hardwood timber and creates a visceral connection to the rainforest.
REVISITED
Words by Katelin Butler Photography by Michael Nicholson
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ROSEBERY HOUSE
As you enter the enchanting rainforest setting that engulfs Andresen O’Gorman’s Rosebery House, the only evidence that you’re just five kilometres from Brisbane’s city centre is a small glimpse of buildings across the river to the west. This house, in Highgate Hill, is an urban sanctuary – a place to feel calm and grounded within the landscape. Rosebery House was originally built in 1997 for Greg Hooper, Lani Weedon and their two children, Hilde and Angus. It is now home to Greta Burkett, who describes her first encounter with the home as like falling in love. “When I walked onto the property, I fell in love with the gully – its beauty made me well up. And [when] we went into the library and saw a glimpse of the river, we imagined that we’d sit and enjoy that view.” The swathe of lush subtropical growth becomes part of your consciousness at every turn, reminding you that you are part of something bigger. The physical form of the house is drawn from the landscape itself and a desire to celebrate and emphasize the topography. “The crease in the land is north–south,” explains architect Brit Andresen, who in 2002 became the first female recipient of the Australian Institute of Architects’ Gold Meal. “The building had to be very narrow to fit on the site. It’s perched along the west-facing ridgeline, just off the stormwater gully floor.” In order to allow for northern light to penetrate deep into the narrow prism, the architects broke the building down into a series of elevated pavilions that require inhabitants to move outside in order to get to the next room. As Brit admits, “It’s a daring thing to do – to force people to move outside to get to another internal space. We made sure to contain the outside areas, so that it was secure.” Greta explains that the separation of the three pavilions has an impact on the way the inhabitant lives and thinks. “When you are in the kitchen, you are focused on food. And when you move into the bedroom pavilion, you are in the sleeping phase.” The only internal circulation space is the stairwell at the sleeping end, which was contained so that the children didn’t have to go outside during the night. On approaching the home, there is no sense of the domestic scale but rather a reference to the immense scale of the landscape. A twenty-metre-long timber battened screen moderates light, privacy, views and access, but additionally masks the smaller scale of the window frames and balustrades. The varying degrees of transparency along
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01 Eucalypt timber battens belie the domestic scale of the building, instead responding to the vast proportions of the landscape.
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02 A narrow clerestory window runs parallel to the storage spine located on the eastern edge of the plan. 03 The strict structural rhythm of the architecture never compromises functionality in the internal spaces. 04 Every room is saturated by breezes, birdsong and the heady scent of rain.
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05 The timber grain of primary posts and beams is reversed to maintain structural integrity, and then visually expressed by its black oiled finish. 06 The home is broken into a series of elevated pavilions, coaxing inhabitants outside in order to move between rooms.
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the length of the screen respond to function and shift with the rhythm of the eucalypt battening. Inside the home, everything is broken down into domestic dimensions, with timber studs at 400-millimetre centres within a structural grid of 1,600 millimetres. There is a small gap between the weathersheild (windows) and sunshield (screen), which slightly angles apart to direct your eye toward the view of the Brisbane River. The glazed pavilions are simultaneously open and protected, and the interstitial space between the screen and the house supports fern growth and contains an outdoor shower, private balconies and a kitchen bay window. A spine of books and storage runs along the eastern edge, where the house is attached to the hillside and a narrow clerestory window running along this spine allows glimpses to the sky. At the same time that the Rosebery House was being designed, Brit’s late husband, architect Peter O’Gorman (1940–2001), was building the Mooloomba House on North Stradbroke Island. This seminal house was an exploration of the expressive capacity of hardwood, and this was continued throughout the design and construction of the Rosebery House. Brit, who is Norwegian-born, has had a long history of research into timber buildings. At the Rosebery House, all the hardwood timber frames are expressed and to avoid the warping and twisting of the timber, the grain is reversed for the posts and beams. “You can see the blade in the cut timber, it has texture,” says Brit. “The main frame has been oiled so that it’s black and the secondary structure is left brown.” The regular timber framing creates a rhythm through the entire length of the building, as you move from
ROSEBERY HOUSE
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one space to another, inside or outside. “The timber gives a daily sensory experience. It’s about the touch,” says Greta. Although the house has a structural rhythm, each of the spaces is specifically tailored to its function. The library or sitting room at the southern end of the home is a quiet zone, sunken down to make it physically and psychologically remote from the rest of the dwelling. The main entry stair leads up to an outdoor entertainment zone, with the kitchen opening onto this deck area. The sleeping area is internally compartmentalized, with a small private balcony and view into the bushland from every bedroom. The lower level contains studio and study spaces, where Lani once worked as a printmaker. The Rosebery House is part of Andresen O’Gorman’s significant contribution to the evolution of the Queenslander house, celebrating and connecting us to our environment through all the senses. This is a highly layered building that intentionally intensifies the experience of the landscape. Being at the home reminds you of your place in the world – you can hear the birds and rain, smell the trees and feel the breezes.
07 Bedrooms for the children are accessed via the sole internal staircase, offering protected night-time passage. 08 Interstitial space between the building envelope and timber screen forms a habitable edge for people and planting. 09 Immersed by subtropical rainforest, this urban sanctuary feels worlds away from the bustle of nearby Brisbane.
Since this story was written, the Rosebery House was sold to new owners, who will no doubt enjoy the house for another generation.
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Lush subtropical growth becomes part of your consciousness at every turn, reminding you that you are part of something bigger.
Architect Andresen O’Gorman East-west section
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Project team: Brit Andresen, Peter O’Gorman Structural engineer: John Batterham Contractor: Lon Murphy
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Home Futures EXHIBITION
Through six themes and a meandering series of dreamlike passages, the Home Futures exhibition revisits predictions made by twentieth-century designers to explore how our understanding of “home” is changing over time. Words by Colin Martin
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How will future changes affect today’s domestic architecture? Will soaring temperatures render the ubiquitous glass boxes grafted onto earlier housing stock uninhabitable? Will families have to seek refuge in dimly-lit, shrouded Victorian parlours? Home Futures contrasts the radical predictions made by twentieth-century architects and designers, for automated or compact homes for example, with the twenty-first century reality. Exhibits include furniture from Alison and Peter Smithson’s House of the Future (1956); footage from General Motors’ Design for Dreaming, a promo for the “kitchen of tomorrow” (1956); photographs of Hans Hollein’s installation Mobile Office (1969); annotated photographs of Haus-Rucker-Co’s Cover Protects You (1971), which defined living areas using light transparent enclosures instead of solid walls; and La casa telematica by Ugo la Pietra (1982), an installation showing homes with small TV screens integrated into household furniture. Some predictions, such as the computerized control of domestic environments, parallel the way we live now, while others seem quaint. We don’t work in inflatable bubbles in parks, as Hollein forecasted; instead we access the internet in coffee shops. At home, massive Orwellian television screens dominate living areas, supplanting nature. No one foresaw that social media would become the default communication setting, even within the home. The exhibits illustrate six themes relating to twenty-first century homemaking: “living smart,” “living on the move,” “living autonomously,” “living with less,” “living
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with others,” and “domestic arcadia.” The exhibition designer, New York-based architecture practice SO-IL, used translucent mesh to create a meandering series of dreamlike passages and spaces. The point at which visitors move between different thematic displays is at times unclear, but, as many of the ideas overlap, this ambiguity is effective and helps to reinforce the complexity of the pressures on housing provision globally. A model of Joe Colombo’s hybrid Total Furnishing Unit (1972) demonstrates that the need to begin thinking about minimizing space occupied and maximizing flexibility was recognized almost five decades ago. The stand-out film exhibit features Gary Chang’s Domestic Transformer apartment (2007) in Hong Kong, for which he designed a system of sliding walls to facilitate twenty-four different layouts and functions within a single thirty-twosquare-metre space. Shot in slanting sunlight, the sequence of transformations is mesmerizing. “It is through the radical visions of the recent past that we consider how our understanding of ‘home’ might be changing today,” says the exhibition’s curator Eszter Steierhoffer in her introduction to an excellent catalogue. With six thematic sections and an afterword, it’s a worthy addition to any architect or designer’s bookcase or hybrid storage system. Home Futures was held at the Design Museum, London, United Kingdom, 7 November 2018 – 24 March 2019 and will open at IKEA Museum, Älmhult, Sweden, in May 2019.
POSTSCRIPT
01 Hans Hollein inside his installation Mobile Office (1969). Photograph: Gino Molin-Pradl. Copyright: Private Archive Hollein. 02 La casa telematica by Ugo La Pietra (1983). Courtesy Archivio Ugo La Pietra, Milano. 03 Gary Chang’s Domestic Transformer apartment (2007). Photograph: Edge Design Institute.