Tinbeerwah House

by Teeland Architects

 Tinbeerwah House by Teeland Architects family residence which connects to the ground and opens to the bush, ocean, stars and sky.

With a brief to create a new family home on a steep hinterland site in Noosa, Queensland, and views out over Noosa and the Pacific Ocean, designers Teeland Architects created a modern rustic home, well suited to its natural surrounding environment.

With ocean views to the east of Tinbeerwah House, designers Teeland Architects faced the challenge of working out how to provide protection from the hot morning summer sun, whilst still maintaining the outlook from the house.

An operable glass pavilion was designed for the house, which has been wrapped in sliding hardwood screens, so the owners can control the light, the breeze, privacy and views. In winter, the screens open-up to let in sunshine, and in summer, they close to provide shade from the hot sun; whilst still maintaining views and breezes through the timber battens.

With the building kept low to the ground in its design, the family are-able to step directly from the house into the garden. The accessible part of the site, had been cleared of vegetation by the previous owners, and the site had also been dramatically cut and filled without the necessary retaining and drainage to stabilise the ground. Because of this, Teeland Architects felt there was great opportunity to use the new house and landscape to stabilise and rehabilitate the land.

With steep hinterland sites, it is easy for the house to end up high above the natural ground and lose your connection to the earth. With young children, the owners were eager to be able to step from the house directly into the garden.

So, working with the existing levels we were able to configure the floor plan so that the kitchen, living, dining and children’s bedrooms opened directly onto garden spaces to encourage the kids to go outside and provide an alternative to screen based entertainment.’ The designers said.

The long thin plan of Tinbeerwah House also ensures the building is only one room deep, to maximise the ocean views, create cross ventilation, and provide an abundance of natural light.

‘The long thin rectangular plan is a design strategy that we have utilised on a number of our projects.

Firstly, on a steep site running a long thin building along the contours allows us to minimise the amount of cut and fill. Seconding, it ensures the building is only one room deep to maximise cross ventilation and natural light for the interior spaces.

Teeland design strategy is to provide the family with opportunities to come together to cook, eat and relax, but also more quiet spaces for reflective time. The long thin plan provides a horizontal separation of the public and private areas of the house.

The kitchen, living and dining open onto the north-east garden and pool. The bedrooms are pushed to the more private southern end of the site, separated by bathrooms and robes.’ says David Teeland, director and founder of Teeland Architects.

Photography by Jared Fowler.

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