10x10 House

by Patchwork Architecture

Situated on the corner of a busy suburban street in Wellington, we were tasked with another slippery slope in the city. The home of our go-to builder and his family, the brief was to design something on one level that captured the killer views of the airport, ocean and brightly painted pak n save.

10×10 is ten by ten. 100 square meters of square. Although it’s a little more than that, if you include the concrete core that helps the building to stand up. Supported at the edges by steel poles and detailed with floor to ceiling glass. Three bedrooms, an office, two bathrooms, and a flat(!) grassy bit for braziers and barbecues.
There’s also a rooftop deck with its own bus stop, accessed by outside stairs and a yellow steel gangway. But you’d be waiting a while if you wanted to hitch a ride, best just to stop, sit and enjoy the view. We reckon it’s a ten out of ten.

Adam, the builder, his wife Alicia, and their daughter Matilda were the clients for this project. Adam is our go-to builder – it’s great to have that working relationship which has been built up over a number of projects, where you understand how each other prefers to do things. We know that Adam is a perfectionist, who likes clean lines, and that’s been reflected in the design of the 10×10 house, which is deceptively simple.

The house is a 10x10m square in plan, sitting on a smaller concrete block base. The base contains the entry, stair, and laundry, and a small office for Adam. Upstairs are 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and the living spaces, which open out onto a sunny deck to the north. Access to the roof terrace is off this deck.

The house is clad in anodised aluminium sheet, and full height glazing. The glazing extends beyond the floor and ceiling (both of which are oak), so that they appear to float as you’re looking out at the view.

The site is a small, steep triangle – sloping down to the south, with a busy road on one side. Part of the design response for this house was to get as high up on the site as possible – both to get as much northern sun into the house, and to avoid (as much as possible) excavation and retaining on such a steep slope.