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This house is very quiet and calm and unusual and exciting. You come down the driveway and
you open the big front door and you enter the space and you're just met with this abundance
of natural light and beautiful views through to the garden that really ground the space.
My name is Kyra Thomas from Kyra Thomas Architects and this is my own home, Queen's Park House.
Queen's Park House is located in Sydney and was originally a storage warehouse.
It had brick walls built to boundary and one roof covering the entire site.
My husband Julian is a developer, I'm an architect and then together
we were the client for the project and we needed to convert what was a
commercial property into residential. What we really liked about the project
is that it was unusual and we knew that we could create something really special.
We started with a cold, dark, completely enclosed
warehouse and the brief for the project was opening that up to create a family home.
So that involved taking the roof off the existing warehouse and then essentially inserting a home
within the walls. We originally had approval for a two-story home and then decided that a one-story
home within the height of the existing walls was much more suitable, subtle and in proportion with
the side. We decided to keep the boundary brick walls of the warehouse because they're built on
boundary and that meant that they allowed us to have a very private zone. They also reflect the
past use of the warehouse which we really liked because it's an unusual site and it's beautiful
to have an element of the past while also building for the future and this site, being in the middle
of a suburban block, essentially is in the back of everybody's back gardens, so keeping those walls
allowed us to create a home that was private, unique and sort of in the middle of the block.
Given the site is completely contained, the four garden courtyards were crucial
in punctuating the plan and creating green space for the house to relate to, so each room has an
orientation to either one or two courtyards and that gives light and air into all the spaces.
I've always been really fascinated by light and the way that light can
transform the space and different diffused light sources was really crucial for me in
the development of the design. So we have big openings in the main living areas,
then in the bathrooms, I've used skylights that run the full length of the room.
I have selected just a few natural materials that all have a patina and a gentleness to them, so
there's a softness. So we've got Italian Limestone floors and that same Limestone runs through the
floor of the whole project; bedrooms, bathrooms, every single space and I love that. I love having
only a few materials. They bring a continuity and they, for me, create a sense of calm.
So what I really aim for in my architecture is textured minimalism. I like to have
minimal forms that are then softened by natural materials and textures.
One of my absolute favourite spaces is my son Bo's room. It has a pocket
sliding window that retracts into the wall and you're immediately met by the
garden and this epic Jack and the Beanstalk Vine that is playful and
beautiful and brings the garden in and you feel very connected between inside and out.
The finished project, I would say, is a total joy. Every single thing was interrogated and reflects
what we need, so it is totally custom to the way that we live and the way that we want to live.
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