Crafted Light-Play – Rosewood House by Madeleine Blanchfield Architects
Uniquely formed from timber as the main and celebrated material, Rosewood House combines nods to the Japanese and Norwegian heritages of its owners, while creating an interesting light-play from within. Madeleine Blanchfield Architects proposes a home of crafted proportions, focusing on a passive yet actively engaged series of spaces that respond to context, embracing the surrounds.
Located in Sydney, Rosewood House disguises its overall mass through a careful coming-together of forms, where linear bands of complementary materials and finishes clad the exterior. Breaking up and animating the streetscape, the forms traverse the steeply sloping site and bind as one over three generous levels, anchoring the building to the site. As an optimised connection to the surrounding aspects and behind a custom timber screen of sorts, filtered light enters the various volumes, ensuring a sense of connection beyond the home remains. Bringing access to natural light and ventilation in the process, the filtered detailing of the timber by Madeleine Blanchfield Architects expresses an approach rooted in a crafted resolve.
Built by Milestone Building, Rosewood House becomes a capture of both the site and its owners, referencing the blending of heritages steeped in traditions where timber is used extensively. The integration of various walled courtyard spaces also offers a sense of relief from the overall form and an intersectional separation between inside and out. Despite the slope of the site, the form makes use of the terrain, burrowing the levels into the ground and creating a split-level approach from the street.
Integral to the home is the incorporation of living landscape amongst the architecture. The spilling over of foliage into the façade from the terraces is testament to that, seeing the built and natural temper one another. Allowing the natural elements to be brought inward, the original sense of privacy and enclosure hinted at from the exterior remains. Yet, internally, the bold and seemingly closed forms open generously to connected and flowing zones, all bound through a common approach to materiality and tone, softening the transition of light as it enters and fills the home. While the lower level connects to the rear landscaped garden, pool and internal living space, the middle level houses the bedrooms, making use of their containment away from the street, leaving the upper level for the living areas to come together and capture surrounding views.
As a recalibration of the expected and traditional arrangement of a home, Rosewood House instead responds to the site and its occupants. Madeleine Blanchfield Architects combines a sense of drama with the subdued, ensuring the ideal secluded and private family home emerges.
