Ocean Grove

New Residence - completed 2019

New 4 bedroom house with frontline coastal views stretching from Portsea through to Lorne. The design wraps around the site, enclosing an elevated, tiered central courtyard and pool area with views straight through the house to the ocean horizon beyond. To the ocean side, the house presents as two stacked, elongated volumes, one sheathed in a fine skin of concrete, the other in hardwood timber that will weather to a pale silver. The concrete wraps over and around the house, binding the volumes and opening at various points to reveal the inner workings of the house. Arranged over three levels, the inner layout is interspersed with pocket courtyards and moments of double and triple height space that amplify the feeling of light and air within the house.  

Builder: Ashley Crowe Builders

Concrete: DMC Concrete Art

Landscape Architect: Bethany Williamson

Photography: Derek Swalwell

Photography styling: Bek Sheppard

Torquay, Victoria

New residence - completed 2015

This is a house of concrete, and the material has been fully embraced with all its inherent strengths and flaws. Paired with natural hardwood, the house is elemental and raw, but nonetheless warm and welcoming as a home for a young family.

Tightly hemmed in by suburban houses but backing onto wetlands and golf course, the house is treated as a walled sanctuary, opening up into itself, an internalised habitat with locally planted roof gardens and curated glimpses onto the wetlands. At street level, an open carport and art studio above invite filtered views into the private world beyond. A translucent battened screen veils the studio, glowing over the street at night when the artist is at work.

Entry is via a portal in the concrete wall, leading into a small, secluded courtyard which acts as an antechamber to the more private areas of the house. Inside, the space immediately opens into a double height gallery, glazed on one side to reveal the plan which wraps around a large central courtyard. Purposed for longevity, the design offers moments of privacy, flexibility of space and room to grow.

Awards / Media:

Victorian Architecture Awards 2016 - Commendation

Houses Awards 2016 - Shortlist

Green magazine Issue 52: Front cover and full article

Photography: Derek Swalwell

Photography styling: Simone Haag

New Residence - Completed 2021

New family house in a leafy Fitzroy street, surrounded by ornate boom era terrace housing. The street facade pays homage to the heritage context then opens up beyond the entry threshold. The upper level is broken up into a series of brick pavilions, hovering over a glazed Northern wall that runs the full length of the house, connecting all living zones and opening up onto pool and courtyards.

Houses Awards

Shortlist - New house over 200sqm

Shortlist - House in a heritage context

Builder: Lazcon Construction

Landscape: Mud Office

Photographer: Derek Swalwell

Photography Styling: Anna Fitzpatrick

Freshwater Creek, Victoria

New Residence - Completed 2019

This project is a new family home on a large rural property. The form of the house is driven by the dual desires of creating intimate and controlled external spaces and equally, embracing the wider landscape beyond the immediate site. The plan revolves around a protected north facing courtyard, cupped between a pair of arching rammed earth walls. A series of lightweight corten-clad pavilions splay off these anchoring spines, breaking down the building mass and zoning the house into living, bedroom and guest wings. The internal spaces spill out into controlled and protected courtyard on one side, and an expanse of sun bleached grassland on the other. A long lap pool on the open side of the house acts as an intermediary to the wider landscape beyond, whilst manipulated moulded hillocks surrounding the house bed the building into the site. 

Final photographs pending

New Residence - completed 2019

New family house in Brighton designed for a wedge shaped site enclosed by neighbours on all sides but with ocean views to be captured from the top floor. The house is split into two offset curvilinear volumes, sited so as to form a series of distinct yet interconnected courtyard spaces that allow generous garden outlook from all rooms and create a feeling of air and space around the house despite the enclosed nature of the site. 

Awards: Houses Awards shortlist (results pending)

Photography: Derek Swalwell

Videography: Thomas Lo

Photography Styling: Bek Sheppard

Renovation - Completed 2019

Extension to a heritage Victorian cottage in Middle Park. The front rooms of the house are retained and remodelled, and a new double storey extension is added to the rear. With a North facing street frontage, the design employs multiple devices to draw light into the belly of the house - a sweeping void cut through the centre of the plan, a courtyard that separates the old and new portions of the house, and an upper level roof deck that provides lush green views from the living area below.

Builder: Lazcon Constructions

Landscape: Mud Office

Photography: Derek Swalwell

Photography styling: Anna Fitzpatrick

New residence - under construction

Sculptural family home of concrete and travertine set out in a courtyard formation over two levels, surrounded by garden and roof terraces

Barwon Heads, Victoria

New residence - completed 2013

Bluff House is a three level house designed for a steeply sloping site backing onto the Barwon Heads golf course. The house is designed as a series of stepped interior and exterior spaces meandering upward from the street towards seclusion and views at the rear of the block. A pair of gnarled and twisted Moonah trees at the rear of the site are a gift the project - their generous canopy enveloping the living zones and their sculptural trunks creating a focal point at the end of the entry axis. The house and landscape are fully integrated, providing a series of fluid living zones and a continuous dialogue between the internal spaces and surrounding environment. The tapered, curved studio space, landscape entry stair and roof planters evoke the local bluff landscape, drawing you up and into the heart of the house.

Awards:

2014 Houses Award Shortlist

2014 Idea Awards Shortlist

Builder: Ashley Crowe Builders

Photography: Trevor Mein & Auhaus Architecture

Ivanhoe, Victoria

New Residence - completed 2016

A new 4 bedroom house built into a heavily treed hill that drops away steeply to a river at the base of the site. The house is divided into two wings, pinching together at the entry then folding away from one another, enclosing wedges of outdoor space in between and creating a separation of the site into manicured front and untamed rear. From the street, the house is hunkered into the hill, with the pedestrian access stepping down into a private entry forecourt bounded by the kitchen and dining area. Through the front door, the view is straight into the treetops, the arching living zone opening onto both the front courtyard and a rear deck, fully immersed in the landscape. The material palette of timber, black and emerald green reflects the colours in the landscape and intensifies the sense of envelopment. The design screens out adjoining neighbours, giving northern aspect to living spaces and focusing views into the treetops. The main living and master bedroom wing cantilevers out into the established tree canopy, creating the feel of a treehouse, with leafy outlook and filtered afternoon light. 

Awards:

2017 Victorian Architecture Awards Shortlist

2017 Houses Awards Shortlist

2017 IDEA Interior Design Awards Shortlist

Builder: DSS Constructions

Photography: Derek Swalwell

Photography styling: Nina Provan

New Residence - completed 2022

A filigree of verdigris fins ripples across the facade, punctured by an exaggerated archway opening. The sculpted double height entry drops pools of light into the plan and draws the eye up and out to the greenery of the courtyard beyond. Voids and pocket courtyards interspersed throughout break down the mass of building, bringing a light and airy feel to the double storey volume.

Final photographs pending

Thirteenth Beach, Victoria

New Residence - completed 2013

A new house on the 13th Beach golf course, bunkering into the dunes and protecting against the strong coastal winds. The embracing masonry walls wrap around a central, north facing courtyard, giving the house an immense sense of privacy and seclusion from neighbouring properties and passing golfers. The encircling plan allows for light, curated vistas and an inherent interconnectedness between the building and landscape. The entry slips between two soaring blade walls into a double height space, the void carrying through the living zone and giving the house a heightened sense of light and space within its contained footprint. The sculpted interior provides distinct yet connected living zones, while the limewashed brick walls create a luminous and tactile surface finish. A cantilevered study perches over the entry, connecting the two living levels.

Photography: Trevor Mein & Auhaus Architecture

Barwon Heads, Victoria

New Residence - completed 2018

New family house in Barwon Heads with a linear plan that embraces a long northern boundary. The ground level living spaces open up all along the length of this northern edge, spilling out onto pool area and garden. The upper level floats lightly over the solid concrete base, veiled in a finely battened timber screen system that allows filtered views into the tree canopy.

Final photographs pending

Builder: Larkin & Drought

Concrete: DMC Concrete Art

Thirteenth Beach, Victoria New Residence - Completed 2015 This is a new 4 bedroom house on the 13th Beach golf course. The sweeping plan takes in the extremities of the wedge shaped site, folding away from the prevailing winds and enclosing a large, sheltered north facing courtyard and pool. Cutouts through the courtyard boundary wall allow foliage to spill through, giving the sense of an endless landscape beyond. All habitable rooms face into the central courtyard, providing outlook and a strong connectedness throughout the house. The split level plan delineates zones within the house whilst the relative height of the two levels obscures the immediate foreground of road / neighbours and provides a vista across to the treelined horizon beyond. Awards: Houses Awards 2016 Shortlist Builder: Ashley Crowe Builders Photography: Derek Swalwell Photography styling: Nina Provan

New residence - completed 2023.

New family home on acreage at the back of Torquay

Builder: Hedger Construction

Final photography pending

New Residence - completed 2023.

Perched on a steep hill, this is a new house with frontline ocean views stretching from Barwon Heads to Cape Schanck. The clean lined concrete and blackened timber design is arranged over three levels, maximising the potential for southerly views whilst allowing for a variety of interconnected internal and external living spaces within the overall envelope. A large sheltered north facing courtyard sits behind the upper level living volume, offering protection from the elements and allowing views through the house to the ocean horizon beyond.

Final photographs pending

New house on a coastal scrub filled site backing on to the Barwon Heads golf course. The sculptural design is formed from insitu concrete.

New family home perched high on the hill with ocean and winding river views

New residence - under construction

New house on a steeply sloping block in Eaglemont. The upper level living zone looks out through the verdant tree canopy and into the valley beyond.

Renovation - completed 2022

This Barwon Heads project is an addition onto an existing Edwardian weatherboard cottage on the river. Unusually, the cottage is located at the rear of the property, and thus the addition becomes the new street frontage. The addition has been split into two pavilions, with a central courtyard tucked behind facing back onto the original house. Addressing the street, a double storey pitched pavilion takes formal cues from the original house, with a low slung single level brick and glass pavilion sitting behind and creating a permeable link between new and old.

Photographs pending

New house on the Bellarine Peninsula. The simple building forms are modulated with an alternating pattern of timber battens and lining board. The house will form a backdrop for extensive native gardens both on the ground and the roofs.

Completed 2023. Final photographs pending

New residence - completed 2022

New single storey house in a leafy Toorak street. A pair of overlapping concrete walls conceal the house from the street, and beyond this house is laid out as a simple glazed pavilion, opening up to courtyards throughout and with the living areas facing out towards a large rear garden. The design relies on modernist principles with clean lines and elongated proportions providing a clarity of space.

Builder: Dimpat

Final photographs pending

New Residence - completed 2024.

This is a new 4 level commercial and residential building purposed for a tight suburban site in Richmond. Pinned in by concrete blade walls, the facade is draped in a delicate brick screen, opening up at ground level with a large arched window to initiate dialogue with the street. The eroded edges of the side walls reference the surrounding industrial rooftops and breakdown the building mass towards neighbouring properties. Internal courtyard and void spaces interspersed throughout the residential areas give a green outlook to all habitable rooms and secure the future amenity of the building, whatever the neighbouring circumstances. 

Final photographs pending

New family house in Melba Parade, overlooking Point Roadknight and down the coast towards Point Addis.

New Residence - completed 2023

The owner of this new house is a keen fly fisherman, and the site edges on to the banks of the Goulburn river. The house is built from rammed earth, its forms deriving from the eddies and rivulets of water circulating and converging around the rocks in the river. A sweeping earth wall forms the public face and entry to the house, just visible behind heavy landscaped mounding. Internally, the wall creates carved and dynamic internal spaces, opening up to a softer rural vernacular along the river edge.

Builder: Hedger Construction

Final photographs pending

Renovation - completed 2023

Renovation of an existing cottage in Northcote. Due to foundational instability caused by a large tree, the front portion of the house is demolished and rebuilt, whilst the rear portion of the existing dwelling is retained.

Final photographs pending

New family home overlooking the Lorne pier

New concrete home perched on a stunning but exposed coastal cliff edge. The house is designed as a walled enclosure, providing protection from the harsh coastal winds while opening up to the coastline views.

The keyhole entry from the street reveals little of the tree-filled site beyond, fanning out and dropping steeply to the Yarra River at its base. To the street edge, the house barely registers, its low slung profile embedded into the hill. On entry, the house immediately opens into double height void, walls of glass taking in the scene of winding river and towering gums below. The linear plan stretches across the site, a minimalist design relying on fine proportions and clarity of space.

New Residence - construction completed 2021

New family holiday house in Barwon Heads. Perched at the top of a hill, the house is organised over a series of levels stepping down the slope. The building programme stretches around the perimeter of the site, enclosing a north facing courtyard and pool, giving garden views to all rooms and obscuring views to and from neighbouring properties. Constructed from locally sourced limestone and using a post and beam methodology through the central courtyard area, the house feels reminiscent of European courtyard villa precedents.

Landscape: Mud Office

Final photographs pending

Completed 2023 - Photography pending

This is a new weekender on a large rural property, and the design takes cues from the local rural vernacular. Two simple pitched roof pavilions are clad in corrugated zincalume and hardwood timber, and are slightly offset from one another to allow for domesticated landscape spaces to develop between.

Built by JTS Custom

Thirteenth Beach, Victoria

New House - completed 2017

New family house in 13th beach Golf Links. The site is on the edge of the main driveway of the estate, creating a prominent public face along one side boundary. This edge condition was the starting point for the design, which is treated as a medieval walled square with a singular concrete wall extending the full length of the public edge, concealing a large north facing courtyard behind. A dune-like embankment rolls up against the wall, merging the house into the landscape and reducing the building mass to a singular line across the site. The floor plan wraps around the north facing courtyard and pool, with a long and slender secondary courtyard separating the house into living and sleeping zones, consolidating garden views and drawing northern light into all rooms.

Final photographs pending

Barwon Heads, Victoria

Alteration and Addition - Completed 2015

The original 1930‘s house was a mash of styles - part cottage, part terrace, part modernist villa. The front of the house lacked definition, any sense of entry and underutilised its generous street setback. The re-design takes in house and landscaping and takes cues from the era in which the original house was constructed. The fine lined insitu concrete addition both simplifies and exaggerates the geometry of the original house, elongating and grounding the building and creating a strong connection to landscape at the front of the site.

Torquay, Victoria

2 new townhouses on the Torquay Esplanade, with 180 degree views across Zeally bay.

New 3 level apartment building tucked in behind Toorak village.

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Barwon Heads, Victoria

Alteration and Addition - completed 2011

An extensive renovation of a tiny weatherboard beach shack in Barwon Heads. The new house was to act as a semi-permanent residence and a holiday house for extended family. The renovation transforms the main house and adds a new guest pavilion, linked by a timber deck. Light and space are amplified within the original floor area by exaggerating the height of the original gabled roof form and opening up the interiors with cathedral ceilings. Ancient tea trees surrounding the deck create a sculptural focal point for both pavilions and act in counterpoint to the strong geometry of the house.

Photography: Auhaus Architecture

Melbourne City Fringe

New Residence - under construction

This project is a new family house located on the edge of an escarpment, with sweeping views along the Maribyrnong valley and towards the city skyline. The design derives from the local geological conditions, resulting in building forms that appear as a series of remnant basalt formations eroded from the site.

Forged from handcut basalt bricks, the building volumes nestle into the hill and pinwheel around a large internal courtyard, sheltered from the winds that drive up the valley. Enclosed glass breezeways link the volumes while providing visual permeability through the site, and further walled gardens are carved out of each living volume to provide controlled and tranquil private open space - a walled oasis in the windswept grassland landscape.

New residence - completed 2018

New 4 bedroom family home on the Warrnambool ocean front. Located on a steep hill that drops straight down to the beach, the site has panoramic views but is also exposed to brutal weather conditions that roll in off the coast. The house is organised around a brick core that harks back to the original use of the land - the vestiges of an old farmhouse, perhaps. The eroded brick walls encircle a north facing living and sheltered courtyard space, and rise steeply to a chimney at street level, creating a marker and anchor point for the house as it falls away down the sharp slope. The remainder of the house wraps around the core in lightweight timber battening that stretches across the site to give ocean views to all living spaces. A series of courtyards nestle into the plan, providing protected and sunny outdoor space sheltered from the coastal winds.

Barwon Heads, Victoria

New residence - completed 2014

A new 4 bedroom house located on a heavily treed site overlooking the Barwon River. The design was imagined as a campsite, nestled in and around the existing Moonah trees. The design hugs the boundaries of the site, enclosing the existing trees in a central landscape. The programme is divided into modules which sit as individual pods on the site, enclosed by a lightweight structure that drapes over the top, forming the main living area. The undulating roof form evokes the Moonah canopy, allowing branches to extend underneath the roof of the outdoor living spaces and drawing the eye into the treetops.

This project is a renovation to a modernist house on a steeply sloping site overlooking trees and Yarra river flats.

The existing and new portions of the house remain as distinct parts, linked by landscaped courtyards and roof gardens. The new pavilion takes cues from the modernist roots of the existing house, a minimalist but sculpted interpretation in concrete and glass. Thick wedges of concrete anchor the house to the site, offset by walls of fine lined glass to create a house that feels at once permeable and grounded.