Brunswick House by Placement | 2022 Victorian Architecture Awards

Brunswick House by Placement | 2022 Victorian Architecture Awards

Residential Architecture (Alterations and Additions)

Sited on an extremely narrow block, the existing house frontage sits flanked by neighbours with topography sloped to rear. The plan showed the typical layover of a bygone era – living sandwiched centrally with little access to light, and ancillary wet areas buffeting the only outlook to landscape - resulting in a closed plan.

To maintain existing footprint of the Victorian home and maximise garden, additional amenity was configured under a steep skillion roof, with solar array on the lower roof adjacent.

This amenity was possible by lowering levels down the site, creating an on-grade connection to living at the rear. This stepping afforded an increase of ceiling height for a mezzanine - seemingly luxurious when juxtaposed by the narrowness of the property.

In resistance to contemporary open-plan, living and dining is partitioned by central wet area and mezzanine, which divides the spaces into intimate gestures - creating separation within a seemingly open volume. Joinery is used to craft space and paired with robust materials creates a timeless backdrop for everyday life. Ingenious solutions by the builders were required on-site to navigate the tetris of concealed services like mech, plumbing, ac, exhaust, in a space that due to the mezzanine conceivably had no floor-to-ceiling walls apart from on boundary.

From the heritage front, the roof form appears conservative due to level changes, and the galvanised roof will form patina over time, adding to texture of the streetscape. Clerestory windows allow natural light to penetrate deep into the building, and the play of light and shadow internally as day plots its course is slowly unfolding as a constant joy and delight for the client.

This key gesture of ‘stepping’ unearthed several latent conditions; extensive amounts of underpinning required swift action structurally to negotiate sheets of basalt that formed a bedrock the length of the site. These groundworks triggered substantial variations; but apart from these, most changes to scope were client directed with the intent of adding amenity – upgrading heating specifications, existing house remedial works, and additions of furniture selections and lighting. Variations were in the order of 10% of the construction value, which was the amount of contingency set aside.

The visual connection to landscape was reinterpreted by a series of two ‘courtyards’ – one located centrally, with the back garden reimagined as a second courtyard, by way of being sandwiched between the open shed and addition opposite. Sightlines of garden from various vantage points in the house was of utmost importance on a small block, and joinery was used to frame these views – banquette seating in dining and in-built sofa in living.

Integrating a gravity fed underground tank was necessary to maintain the small amount of garden area, long sightlines, and a feeling of space. Planting was selected to ensure the tank was overgrown - the result is a reinvigorated garden that boasts native flora, providing respite to native fauna in a dense suburban landscape, and ultimately an idyll for the client during the lockdowns, stationed in one place for work and living.

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The Australian Institute of Architects Presentation to Juries offered entrants in the 2022 Victorian Architecture Awards an opportunity to address judges with their nominated projects.

Featuring some of Australia’s most prominent architects, Presentation to Juries is a rare opportunity for the public to learn about the influences behind some of Victoria’s most innovative buildings and follow the architectural process from concept to construction.

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