Detailed and Discrete – Brunswick Lean-To by Blair Smith Architecture
Modest in scale, discrete in form, and holding the key functional areas of the home, Brunswick Lean-To fulfils many criteria of the structures that form almost ubiquitous appendices to Melbourne’s period housing stock. Yet the project is not merely the traditional lean-to redux. Rather, Blair Smith Architecture has deliberately combined elements of the lean-to with thoughtful detailing and enduring materiality to create a contextually appropriate addition to a Victorian cottage.
The project was born of a collaborative relationship with the clients, a family of three, explains architect Blair Smith. “In the first conversation we had, they talked about looking forward to the actual design process almost as much as moving into the finished house. That really struck me as a sign of a good process ahead.” Their brief was for a simple addition that retained the program of the original lean-to it replaced, albeit in a more effective, open and permeable capacity.
The most important lessons that the new design took from that former structure were of modesty and utilitarian simplicity – essentially, of building only as much as necessary. “The choice to build small was one of the defining aspects of the project,” says Blair, explaining that the relatively generous site could have easily accommodated twice the floor area and that, even taking the heritage overlay into consideration, a double-storey addition could have likely been possible. “The clients abandoned the real estate-driven fear of under capitalisation and instead focused on building only as much as they needed.”
But where the lean-tos of old are typified by their ad-hoc nature and lightweight construction, the Brunswick Lean-To is detailed and enduring. Its northern facade is bookended by masonry walls, the fineness of the eave above balancing the strength of the brickwork, between which operable timber screens are interpolated with full-height glazing. “The building is overall highly discrete, so the northern elevation is the only point where a contemporary exterior is evident,” Blair reflects. “Throughout the design process, the phrase that kept coming up was ‘strong but elegant’, which became the unofficial mantra. The brick walls either side of something more delicate and refined reflect that part of the brief.”
The deliberately modest scale of the addition required the design to be highly condensed, with every move addressing multiple considerations. For example, the nature of the brick walls, eave, and timber screens speak not only to an aesthetic agenda but are also a response to the heritage context, a measure that mitigates overlooking from the neighbouring multistorey development, and the means by which the building connects the internal spaces with the backyard beyond.
“The original cottage sits within the middle of a set of three that are all intact, and, more broadly, it is in a cohesive part of the street that has a sustained sense of the Victorian era, so from the outset we knew the addition needed to be discreet and visually defer,” says Blair. “The new addition is much lower than the cottage – not just lower than the peak of the roof but lower even than the eave, and it tapers away from the cottage.”
“In the first conversation we had, they talked about looking forward to the actual design process almost as much as moving into the finished house.”
But while it is deferential, the dark palette and contrasting materiality give the addition its own identity. And, though it is low, the lean-to is protective while simultaneously crafting a genuine connection between the interior and the garden outside. “The eave performs as a sort of ‘cap’ for privacy that prevents overlooking from adjacent upper levels of the three-level residential building to the north,” says Blair, “then the screens provide that additional layer of privacy if desired.”
Privacy does not come at the expense of connection to the garden, however. The main kitchen and dining space and the bathroom both open directly onto the yard, and the sense of proximity is enhanced by the plantings brought close to the built edge so that the threshold seems to bleed into the garden. Commonly, Australian houses have a deck or paving separating them from the garden, but here, the intention was “almost to stitch or graft the new building into the existing garden. The plants being there implies the new intervention has been ‘cross-pollinated’ from the edible garden directly opposite,” he explains.
This idea is also felt in another, less obvious design decision. Blair and the clients shared a preference for low lighting, so the ceiling is free of downlights and lighting restricted to a few select wall sconces. Towards evening, as the light fades outside, the reduced lightning indoors emphasises the experience of the twilight so that “when you’re inside, it almost feels like you’re sitting out in the garden at dusk,” he says. “Then by night, there is a palpable sense of calm within, almost as if you are ensconced within a dimly lit den of some kind.”
The interiors continue the language of the architecture, deepening the sense of connection between inside and out and the awareness of the definition between the original cottage, which houses the bedrooms and a sitting room, and the new lean-to. Dark walls painted in a textural, subtly lustrous paint and the reflective white tiles in the kitchen and bathroom respond to the quality of the northern light that enters, while the ribbed ceiling recalls the rhythmic lines of the screens outside.
Within a small parcel, Brunswick Lean-To wraps an array of ideas and required functions through a restrained, single-minded approach. In deliberately doing only what is necessary, the addition continues the legacy of its predecessor. But in doing so with such finesse, consideration, and elegance, it casts the idea of the humble lean-to in a new light.
“That really struck me as a sign of a good process ahead.”
