A Welcome Reprieve – K&T’s Place by Nielsen Jenkins

Nestled amongst its neighbourhood of fast-growing developments, K&T’s Place is a welcome reprieve from the vertical onslaught, offering a sense of protection from its adjacencies. Nielsen Jenkins combines a sense of enveloping warmth and sensitivity to context through the expression of the original details.

As the ultimate expression of the Queensland lifestyle, the renovation of the existing ‘Queenslander’ home was conceived as both a preservation and restoration effort, undertaken through a contemporary and carefully detailed lens. Surrounded by its neighbourhood of fast-growing developments in its suburb of Brisbane, the new works are defined by the idea of protection – from the many nearby vertical expansion and of the original home. With an acute understanding and appreciation for the provenance of place-making, Nielsen Jenkins combine the warmth of enveloping timber with cooling masonry work that both act as a counterbalance to the original painted timber detail of the existing home.

Surrounded by its neighbourhood of fast-growing developments in its suburb of Brisbane, the new works are defined by the idea of protection – from the many nearby vertical expansion and of the original home.

With one of the clients a practising artist, the expression of the clients’ personalities and lives is seen through select pieces of art and design. The studio and gallery space are contained within the under-croft, but artworks and selected design pieces are found throughout the home. In the dining space, the pendant light is by Anna Markey, and throughout the home, artwork by Noel McKenna, Keith Burt, Tony Albert, Matt Tobin, Ben Walsh, Miles Hall and Sandra Okalyi dot the walls and add expressive animation to the v-groove interior walls.

Built by Struss Constructions, with engineering by Westera Partners, K&T’s Place provides a sense of relief from the tall surrounding urban streetscape, bringing the it back down to a relatable and human scale. Flanked on one side by a sixteen-storey development to the west, and future development to the south, the new and renovation works to the home are centred around a grounding process. The use of select materiality speaks to an extension to this ethos, where masonry block work sits wrapped by natural warm timber. Internally, the use of a cool and muted palette becomes the perfect backdrop foundation for the resulting artwork displayed.

While many aspects of the home were preserved, the internal reconfiguration sees a more open and connected floor plan emerge, and then convene at the rear with a masonry fireplace gesture around which many activities pivot. The new works see the addition of two bedrooms downstairs and an accompanying deck. These elements also led to a series of landings that allow a flexibility in functional use and better connect the home and its owners to the site. Meanwhile, linear elements introduce light and landscape inside, and also create visual and ventilatable cross-throughs in the home.

K&T’s Place is a welcomed reminder of the architectural past of Brisbane that, through its amendments and additions, clearly looks to its future. The resulting haven that is carved into its inner-city locale extends the life of its existing bones. Nielsen Jenkins has breathed a new life into this wearied home – and indeed enlivened the streetscape it sits among, balancing ideas of privacy and expression.

K&T’s Place is a welcomed reminder of the architectural past of Brisbane that, through its amendments and additions, clearly looks to its future.