A Quiet Insertion – Killora Bay by Lara Maeseele and Tanner Architects
With a unique and immersive siting, Killora Bay sits carefully woven unobtrusively amongst an established and dense natural setting on Tasmania’s Bruny Island. Through a sensitive approach, Tanner Architects in collaboration with Lara Maeseele respond to the nuanced directives of the terrain, composing a form that lies as a quiet insertion amongst the landscape in a respectful co-occupation.
Amongst canopies of Tasmanian white gums and grass trees, Killora Bay is conceived as a delicately layered and considered addition to its location on Bruny Island. Both in navigating its sloping terrain and dense native foliage, the resulting form is imagined as a viewing station from which to engage with the surrounds, while allowing its owners to live in such a unique setting upon their occasional visits to the island. The structure is sited based on an existing and predetermined footprint, ensuring the landscape remained untouched and as unaffected as possible. As a collaborative effort, with architecture by Tanner Architects and the interiors by Lara Maeseele, the resulting home draws from the surrounding context for material and textural cues to encase the experience and connect to a reinforced sense of place.
Built by Driftwood Workshop, together with structural engineering by Aldanmark, Killora Bay needed to touch the earth lightly and its process of construction adhere to similar principles. The structure is approached remotely, through dense foliage and across the sloping terrain, allowing the timber-clad form to reveal itself slowly through the natural patterning of the landscape. An elemental approach sees a sense of expressed contrast delineate between the built and the natural, while finishes and a shared tonality bind the two. In its remote siting, the building needed to adhere to bushfire requirements and sees the exterior clad in locally sourced silver-top ash timber, which is then brought inward into the home, ensuring that same connection to the surrounds is felt internally.
Designed to accommodate an array of guests, the planning is intentionally flexible and is centred around the shared living spaces, creating a natural hierarchy of active and retreat zones. An exterior verandah structure acts as an extension of the entry foyer, while also creating a shaded exterior space as needed. Dousing the home in natural light, select openings to the façade offer glimpses of the surrounds, while skylights above welcome natural light into the spaces and reduce the reliance on additional energy. Integrated joinery throughout ensures amenity and storage is concealed, allowing the living and circulation spaces to feel unencumbered and instead outwardly focused on the external views.
While Killora Bay sympathetically engages with its natural surrounds, Tanner Architects and Lara Maeseele have created a warm and welcoming abode, allowing a unique occupation within such a rare setting.
