An Outward Engagement – Harley House by Angus Wirth

As a celebration of the landscape, Harley House sees a series of interlocking spaces come together, mediating between inside and out under one shared roof. Angus Wirth investigates and explores the traditional relationship between the built and the natural within a suburban setting, creating a uniquely engaged home in the process.

 Ensuring each internal space interacts with the landscape in some form, Harley House is conceived from a place of outward assembly. While the traditional residential home turns its back both on the fronting street and its garden, in this case, the focus is on the connection to the surrounds and ensuring the experience of the home reflects its proximity to the ocean and the original native vegetation. Located in Avalon, the home incorporates strategies to abate incoming winds and to optimise northern sun to its advantage, positioning the home accordingly. Together with interior design by Housed Architects, Angus Wirth embarked on the closely personal project, exploring the expected and challenging the traditional approach to create a home that deeply reflects its owners.

In its responsive approach, the home is comprised of a number of interlocking forms that sit under a shared fly roof structure, where a hardwood ‘ribcage’ provides the support for the protective sheets to sit about.

Built by Girdler Constructions, Harley House is intended as a generational home, spanning and connecting across time and with its family as an expression of place and their individual connection. Throughout the home, open garden areas divide the form as a whole and offer a sense of relief, bringing in natural light and ventilation in the process. In its responsive approach, the home is comprised of a number of interlocking forms that sit under a shared fly roof structure, where a hardwood ‘ribcage’ provides the support for the protective sheets to sit upon. Through the incorporation of polycarbonate sheeting, subtle light is also brought deep into the internal zones, naturally illuminating the home where possible.

By removing the traditional front fence, from the offset the home feels intentionally ingrained into its site. Operable window and façade elements allow the building to open and breathe as needed, taking in the outdoors and ensuring a controlled sense of flow. With flexibility in the planning and through the creation of zones internally, the home is able to be broken down and compartmentalised as family grows and also to expand as needed to connect. A deliberately raw materiality sees precast concrete elements used alongside timber, intended to age and weather from the sea air, while also having low maintenance requirements.

A deliberately raw materiality sees precast concrete elements used alongside timber, intended to age and weather from the sea air, while also having low maintenance requirements.

Through a necessary robustness, Angus Wirth’s Harley House utilises resilient elements to reinforce its location, while warm and textural insertions ensure a familiar invitation.