Engaging Expansion – Brunswick House by Lisa Breeze Architect

What started as a love affair with an existing heritage home soon grew into the restoration and expansion of Brunswick House. Lisa Breeze Architecture combines a celebration of the existing history with a contemporary animation of the new spaces, actively engaging the extents of the site.

There is a charm and reverence to any heritage home and the thought of the many lives and stories that occurred in its walls. The clients of Brunswick House were enamoured by the detailing and crafted nature of the original home, and although it needed restoration work, decided to take on the project as an evolving process. Located on a secluded and quiet street in Melbourne, both rarities in their own right, the home sits neatly restored and as a quaint reminder of the architectural past of the area. The addition sits unobtrusively from street view to the rear, behind the silhouette of the original home. Lisa Breeze Architect focuses on enlivening the existing and injecting the personalities of its owners through the new works.

The addition sits unobtrusively from street view to the rear, behind the silhouette of the original home.

As a combined effort, the existing home was restored and repaired where needed, and the new addition added behind the original, adding much needed amenity over its multiple levels. Built by Silverstream Constructions, Brunswick House is immersed in newly curated gardens, designed by MUD Office, completing the picture and optimising the site from boundary to boundary. As is the case with many older homes, the sense of separation from the formal planning contradicts the way in which we live today. The addition aims to solve this, and acts as a connection between an open series of spaces that capture modern life. Opening to the surrounds was also key to the new works and allowing a better connection between inside and out. The connections between the older and newer elements then feel more deliberate.

Originally of Edwardian origins, the ornateness of the timber and plaster details of the original home become a balancing point to counter the new. Instead of competing, the two eras of the home act as complements to one another, one more ornate and delicate and the other more open and streamlined. Funnelled through the central corridor, the new living, dining, and kitchen space opens to the rear garden, while an upper-level tucks further bedrooms and a dedicated parents’ retreat away from view. Ascending further to the upper most level, above the bedrooms, a roof terrace is placed to take advantage of views out and the changing seasons.

Funnelled through the central corridor, the new living, dining, and kitchen space opens to the rear garden, while an upper-level tucks further bedrooms and a dedicated parents’ retreat away from view.

Lisa Breeze Architect’s Brunswick House captures the spirit of the present and its current owners. Simultaneously, the home also acknowledging the past, further adding to its rich and ongoing narrative.