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by Whiting Architects

From The Architect

The brief was for a couple down-sizing from a large home in Brighton (with pool and large garden) to a city ‘town house’.

The project needed options for family gatherings, entertaining & having guests and various grown up kids to stay. The outside area comprised of a small low maintenance garden, an undercover, off-street parking, a decked outdoor area, bin & bike storage and a veggie patch with espaliered fruit trees.

The renovation included an entertaining area with good sized dinning table and sitting area for gatherings of the large and growing extended family but still needed intimacy when its just occupied by a couple.

The renovation was relatively small but needed all the aspects of a larger build, master-bed room with ensuite & robe, guest bathroom, powder-room, laundry area, storage, functional kitchen with a bench height table & an area to sit up at stool height to eat or read the paper over looking the garden.

A ‘yoga instructing and meditation room’ with storage and desk space situated to make it easy for a group of people to come and go without disturbing the rest of the house was a major consideration.

Space was a premium, so Whiting Architects needed to double up use.

The grand front reception room with its ornate period ceiling, fire place and box-bay window was an perfect space for yoga and mediation and the bay window was a logical place for a desk. Extra walk-in storage space for yoga equipment was achieved by pushing out to the boundary on the side, utilising the dead space along the adjoining lane-way.

Whiting Architects achieved the guest-room by doubling it up as a separate formal living area.The master bedroom is located at the front, away from the main living kitchen area. The robe is disguised as a boxed element ‘inserted’ into the centre of the 2 room area forming the spine of the ensuite / robe. This gives an overlap of spaces, the spine accentuates depth and keeps the spaces more open, yet items are concealed & storage is plentiful. The new powder-room has a concealed toilet and a shower. It works as a spare bathroom for guests and is located behind the laundry area closer to the rear living / guest-room area.

The laundry is concealed within the kitchen area. Door panels open out and lock-off to create an enclosed space for laundry activities, accessible from the kitchen but screened form the living area. This area can be closed up and the space dissolves back into the kitchen dining area. Having the Laundry in the kitchen is a distinct advantage for the client. The area also opens out to a small side drying court.

The upright box form in the kitchen area contains & conceals the washing machine & dryer as well as supporting a wall mounted oven. This box features a ‘planked up’ look offering texture in tribute to the period home but presented as an obviously new interpretation. The oven location was selected for maximum accessibility and practicality. It has its ‘back to the room’ so remains out of view.

The clients wanted to breakdown the contemporary kitchen look. The architects placed a bench height tapered leg stone topped timber table in the middle of the kitchen, butting into the ‘planked up’ laundry box. Under this bench height table on the kitchen side is the dishwasher and associated storage,again discreetly located to remain out of sight from the dining / living room. In an abstracted sense the high table is a take on the traditional Australian kitchen table situated in the middle of the space. A fully integrated refrigerator & freezer is located behind a lining board wall. The area features concealed storage & pullout pantries.Whiting Architects extruded the depth of the rear kitchen window and provided a bi-folding window, over an indoor outdoor timber bench bench. The area is a sun trap in winter and a pass through to the deck mounted BBQ in summer.

The dining table is located directly over a raised clerestory space used to catch and expel heat in summer and offer greater natural light penetration in winter. It helps define the space asa dining area without the need to enclose the space with walls. Appropriately lit, the space works well in a formal dinning situation and equally as well when flooded with natural daylight during informal lunch time gatherings. It also helps frame and extend the views from the entrance hall down through the centre of the house.

The living space is low key and intimate in the evenings and light filled and during the day, opening out to the deck & garden beyond.The area features a concealed study desk which operates like a traditional ‘sectetaire’. The top of the box hinges up to reveal a desk space and file storage area, easily closed away should guests arrive. The corresponding, matching box above hides the air-conditioning unit.

The carport doubles as a covered entertaining designed in relation to the garden and deck