Walter&Walter . photos: © Ben Hosking
The house is composed of a field of rooms that open up and close down in response to the landscape.
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A simple massing focuses the viewers’ attention on the relationship of the house to its environment providing a compelling street presence. The selective openings of the house create moments of porosity for landscapes to inhabit. These different landscape conditions are each unique responses to the orientation of the space embracing the specific qualities of light, air and space.
Revitalised relationships have been created between the house and elements of its natural environment.
Openings in the facade, at various scales, reset territorial boundaries creating diverse connections and dialogues between neighbouring buildings, landscapes and the people that occupy them.
Materiality is a detail often oversimplified or over complicated. A rough sawn timber used for the exterior reveals a native material quality often erased during manufacturing. This rough and protective boundary embraces the natural variation of the material. Moving through the house the material texture changes and volumes open up and collide with landscaped spaces that punctuate the plan. Opacity makes way for transparency, privacy for openness and inclusion.
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Award Winner 2017- Australian Institute of Architects
