New home design – Stirling street residence

Thinking outside the box resulted in a Noah’s Ark style home that is both eclectic and comfortable.

The brief for this new home was quite clear – the clients did not want a white box minimalist house. Nor did they want a house that dictated the style under which they should live. With an eclectic and interesting collection of artworks, designer furniture, industrial junk and ‘found-objects’, a home that could lend itself to a more quirky and complex form but without a dominating style was called for.

Internally the programmatic intent was to ensure that the ground floor did not feel like a ‘tube’ of living spaces. To achieve this, the living room and kitchen areas were separated by a joinery form that wraps around the staircase.

Innovative design

To improve the quality of space and allow for more generous headroom within the upper levels the entire building was set down below the external ground level.

The kitchen has now become the central focus of a less formal contemporary home, and the rumpus room for the house is in what would have been the attic in a traditional terrace but remains connected to the rest of the house by its loft configuration.

The majority of the house is timber framed, with some steel elements allowing for some of the architectural complexities, such as the corner windows.

Timber cladding was sourced from managed certified sustainable yield forests, and was a direct homage to the derelict weatherboard cottage that previously sat on the site.

A child friendly house with a character and a story to tell, the house has already been dubbed the Ark by the locals, and is a stunning injection into the landscape.