Arch2O.com

Arch2O.com - Architecture & Design Magazine
“Elm & Willow House” involves restoration and alteration to the existing Edwardian house and the demolition and construction at the rear of a new addition. The transparency and openness of the new part is a deliberate counterpoint to the introverted Edwardian house with its dark central corridor. Our intention was to create an ?inside is outside is inside? environment, where inside and outside spaces were interchangeable elements. The project evokes a certain reference to the Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe and many courtyard houses in Melbourne by McGlashan and Everist.
Photography: Earl Carter
The two mature Elm and Willow became the constraints to the project. They informed the arrangement of our new addition, and together with passive solar orientation, the result is a U-shaped plan enclosing a north-facing courtyard.
The structure is suspended over the ground to avoid damaging the critical root zones of the two trees. The concrete floor and roof slabs are meticulously detailed, with significant input from our structural engineer, to appear and feel light, floaty and airy – a dialectic relationship between weight and material. This quality is enhanced by a skeletal structure of ?skin and bones?, in which the non-load-bearing glass sliding windows become a mere breathing skin between occupants and the outside world.
Photography: Earl Carter
Internal planning strategies were devoted...