Taking the form of a labyrinthine house-within-a-house, Home Truth by Breathe, the winning design of the NGV Architecture Commission for 2024, invites audiences to envision an alternative way of building homes in Australia.
Highlighting how small-scale architecture can create homes that are more sustainable, higher-quality and community-orientated, Home Truth presents a powerful yet elegant commentary on our nation?s ranking as the country with the largest average house size on earth.
The project invites audiences to enter a space that questions the ethical and ecological impact of very large homes commonly being built around Australia. An external house frame represents the oversized silhouette of the average Australian home. Ranking among the largest in the world, the average Australian home is 236m² in size, ahead of the United States, the UK, France and Canada, as reported in 2020 by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Nestled inside the silhouette of the larger home, is a quiet, reflective timber volume that represents the footprint of a smaller-scale home. By drawing attention to and contrasting the scale of these two structures, Home Truth highlights how small footprint housing could help curtail suburban sprawl, lessen the environmental impact of housing construction and create a better quality of life for communities. The work is intended as a provocation to audiences, inviting them to consider new and sustainable ways of building homes and the positive lifestyl...