Timber Veil – Noosa Heads House by Vokes and Peters

Reinterpreting the traditional Queenslander verandah typology, Noosa Heads House sees the existing home cloaked with a newly conceived timber veil. Vokes and Peters adds to the conversation about responding to context and living in harmony with climate while connecting to an important part of the architectural history of the region.

Noosa Heads House sees the transformation of an existing brick home into a place of restful recharge for its owners. Set in its beautiful Noosa Heads surroundings, ensuring an engagement beyond the exterior bounding walls was an important instigator for the new works, allowing a more immersive feel and facilitating the natural elements to become part of everyday life. With hinterland views and a mature poinciana tree on site, enhancing access to and framing views outward was key to ensuring a connected home. Through an overall opening approach, one of the most significant gestures is a lightly coloured timber batten screen that encases the existing form, binding the overall through a sinuous surface. Vokes and Peters looks to the traditional Queenslander style as muse, while defining a unique response.

In recognising the important role that such outdoor spaces play in the region, the result sees dedicated zones that naturally form within the space between the existing brick and the timber screen.

Built by Love 2 Build, Noosa Heads House draws on the original idea of elevated homes in the area that allow breezes to pass through the form. While the elevation provided an outdoor covered space that could be occupied, it also was encircled by a verandah that, though open to the elements, still felt private. In combining this approach with recognising the important role that such outdoor spaces play in the region, the result sees dedicated zones that naturally form within the space between the existing brick and the timber screen. The screen then offers another layer of privacy, and within, the home is robust and functional.

While the outer silhouette of the home remains, in materiality and feel it is unrecognisable – yet now, it feels more befitting and appropriate to the climate. In restructuring the home, there are various levels of transparency and openness overlaid throughout, allowing for a sense of seclusion and intimacy and other areas of shared togetherness. The outer lightness of the home is contrasted by an inner warmth of timber lined spaces that connect each of the interior zones. The inspiration for the timber can also be traced back to a legacy of local architects using the plywood heavily in their work, adding texture and thermal mass while remaining low maintenance and economical.

The outer lightness of the home is contrasted by an inner warmth of timber lined spaces that connect each of the interior zones.

Through a study of use and occupation, Noosa Heads House is opened to engage both its site and the surrounding views. In drawing from the history not just of the existing building but the architecture and designers in the region, Vokes and Peters proposes a contemporary take on a tried and tested response to place.