Profile: Brad Swartz of Brad Swartz Architects

Big is not necessarily beautiful for Sydney architect Brad Swartz, who has made his name focusing on the smart utilisation of space in small footprints but hasn’t limited his thinking across broader horizons.

Architect Brad Swartz’s first project under his own name was both a blessing and a curse. In 2015, while working for Akin Atelier, he designed the renovation of a small studio apartment in the inner Sydney suburb of Darlinghurst for himself and his partner. The ingenious design of the 27-square-metre apartment arranged the living spaces like a Tetris puzzle, providing its occupants with everything they needed to live comfortably, including a generous kitchen and a separate sleeping alcove. It won awards and countless accolades, and brought Brad his first commission – for an even smaller apartment.

“Our focus as a practice is building predominantly in the inner city with apartments and terrace houses of all scales.”

Boneca Apartment in Rushcutters Bay is just 24 square metres and further refined Brad’s idea that luxury living is not just a question of having lots of space. Unlike the Darlinghurst apartment, the redesign of this 1960s studio has no separation between the living and sleeping spaces. Instead, it has a built-in sleeping loft that is screened off with a sliding timber-battened partition. This innovative solution brought Brad even more press attention. “It very quickly became ‘This guy’s good at doing small spaces,’” he says.

The problem it presented though was that it is very hard to sustain a viable architectural practice when you are only designing micro apartments with modest budgets. “I knew we wouldn’t last in business just doing projects like that,” says Brad. “So we shifted our focus a bit to concentrate on the inner city, and that’s kind of where we’ve stayed. Our focus as a practice is building predominantly in the inner city with apartments and terrace houses of all scales.”

“We’ve done so many [smaller apartments] that there almost ends up being these little templates where you go, ‘Aha, I’ve seen this floor plan before’, so we know instinctively how to approach the redesign.”

When The Local Project met with Brad, the biggest project his firm has designed was under construction in the well-heeled Sydney suburb of Bellevue Hill. The house is a totally new build – rather than a renovation – with a construction cost of several million dollars. “It’s not a typical project for us, it’s something of an outlier,” says Brad. “There is a natural progression for architects where you start off doing small projects and eventually you start doing bigger and bigger ones.” With a bigger house where space isn’t a problem as an architect, Brad needs to make up his own restrictions. “Otherwise, you’re just putting rooms on rooms and just making a big house for the sake of it,” he says.

Brad says he likes the challenges that come with designing smaller spaces, so his firm will always be a two-speed business: doing larger-scale projects that generate more income as well as maintaining his reputation for good design in tight spaces. “We’ve come up with a really good process for designing small apartments in a cost-effective way,” says Brad. “We’ve done so many of them that there almost ends up being these little templates where you go, ‘Aha, I’ve seen this floor plan before’, so we know instinctively how to approach the redesign.” As well as the Bellevue Hill house, his firm also had a modest 50 square-metre apartment in Bondi under construction at the same time.

“There is so much embodied energy in our buildings that reusing quality older housing stock is one of the most sustainable things we can do.”

Brad’s passion for smaller spaces is about showing people that there can be a better way to live, which, while still aspirational, doesn’t necessarily mean a big house. “I think they [smaller spaces] are a much better option than having to live an hour commute away from work. The thing that’s lacking in apartments is families,” he says. “I’ve done a few apartments for families, but I think there’s a whole mindset that has to change in Australia.”

Apartment renovations – adapting an existing property so that its occupants can live more efficiently – is also a more sustainable way to design. “Reusing existing buildings is critical to the future,” says Brad. “There is so much embodied energy in our buildings that reusing quality older housing stock is one of the most sustainable things we can do. I don’t think tearing down something perfectly good to build a sustainable house is sustainable. And it doesn’t matter how many solar panels you put on a massive house, it’s just not sustainable.”

“A lot of the stuff we’re trying to do with apartments – that we can make them aspirational and comfortable at the same time – I think would translate really well to a hotel.”

His firm’s inner-city remit now also extends to London. Brad Swartz Architects is designing a small apartment in the English capital for a client who stayed at Boneca Apartment (several of Brad’s designs are available to rent on Airbnb) and wanted to know if he could do something similar for a crash pad he had recently bought. As it happened, a former employee of Brad Swartz Architects had moved back to London and was able to work on the documentation of the project.

Given Brad’s skill with creating liveable small spaces, it is not surprising that his dream commission is not a large house with a limitless budget, as it might be for most residential architects. Instead, he would rather design a small boutique hotel to showcase what his firm can do within tight constraints. “A lot of the stuff we’re trying to do with apartments, that we can build little spaces for anyone to live in and make them aspirational and comfortable at the same time – I think that would translate really well to a hotel. And then people could walk in and go, alright, I could live like this.”