'Architecture works well when it makes life better, it can bring comfort, ease and joy into your life'
'Architecture works well when it makes life better, it can bring comfort, ease and joy into your life'
A small house for my family, in Westmere, Auckland.
our house: a house for my family / 2018
Westmere, Auckland
Home New Zealand June / July 2019
NZIA Auckland Architecture Awards / May 2021
NZIA National Architecture Awards, Housing 2021
Winner of the Sir Ian Athfield Award for Housing 2021 - the highest award for housing in NZ by the Institute of Architects
This is a small house, on a small suburban site on the ‘wrong’ side of the road. The project was about doing the best I could for my family, to meet our budget. The house design needed to balance sun with privacy, and to maximise the use of space. Amenity is squeezed out of every corner - no space is wasted. It is tight, but where it counts, it feels generous.
This house is a modern interpretation of the bungalows that surround us in Westmere. The California Bungalow is an old fashioned house type; a discreet, formal, but asymmetric building. The porch faces the street, but there is an interior world hidden behind it. The exterior faces the street, but the interior is more about us. I like the disparity between the outside face and the inside one. The outside tries to fit in. The inside is more complex, darker, more dramatic. It was fun to explore these ideas with our own home.
I have spent years working alongside clients creating homes, but I have a deeper understanding of the process from the other side of table now.