I think shelter means many things I think shelter means a place of respite out of
the wind and the rain I also think shelter means something deeper and that means that
we needed in the house to account for a place to view the weather running past and be out of
that weather but also a place to retract into and personally feel safe and secure.
The house is on the very eastern aspect of Waiheke Island here in the Hauraki Gulf of
Auckland New Zealand, the eastern side of the island is less densely populated made up of
mainly farmland and native bush there is a real sense of journey in arriving here the aspect of
the site of the island is big water views out to Pakatoa Island and the Coromandel Peninsula River.
The clients that owned the site for a decade before you had started work the sense of being
in the outdoors and entertaining up on that exposed ridgeline was really important to them
they'd use the site also as a place of respite from their intensely urban lives
these things really lay the foundations for the home.
This spent we were tasked with providing a wonderful platform for entertaining
that didn't need the key swings in the ensuites that go with all of the normal urbane luxuries
what this meant is we were designing small, small and specific.
We think it takes a certain braveness to choose quality over scale
it's not that often that we make one-and-a-half-bedroom residences.
The home is made up of two pavilions in plan these are slightly offset from one another.
The seaward pavilion is framed by a piece of landscape that rises up out of the ground the
way the stone wall is shaped it curves around you to hold you, we have glass to all three
sides that glass butterflies outwards and reveals a lovely connection with the lawn at your feet
conceptually we've thought about the house as a canopy propped high at the mouth of a cave.
The home is not made of crisp white paint it is
rather understood as a piece of landscape rather than building.
The stone of the wall is stacked it's not a veneer and the floor is
layered too these things have weight, they have friction, they have mass.
As a counterpoint there is a blade-like roof that delicately balances across that landscape wall
we were playing similar games with tones of materials and volumes of it
in the respective spaces too that we were starting light and we were starting full
in the seaward pavilion and once we had found the more cave-like space for the bedroom wing
the materials become much darker here the spaces are much narrower much lower
in essence what we were doing was amplifying one by having the other in contrast.
There is a small fissure in the stone wall that reveals the entry to the bedroom pavilion
here the space feels more like it's been excavated from the mass rather than partitioned by walls
in this space the passages are much narrower and the ceiling is too.
The acoustics are much softer and the shadows are more intense
the bedrooms feel like they've been excavated from a mass rather than partition by walls.
What we think this lens is privacy and security that this is a cave-like space
it is the opposite it is the counterpoint to our big light-filled seaward pavilion.
So you might consider bathing as preparing oneself for rest or for a day ahead and
bathing I think means to be vulnerable and vulnerable means to have thin skin.
There are two opportunities for bathing in the home the first is buried in the depth of the
stone wall itself there is no view here, there is a small aperture that exists overhead that
allows a small portion of light to filter through into that space. Here the bathroom holds onto
you really tightly and there is a real sense of focus being in the space, the second opportunity
for bathing in the home is an excavation of a bathtub from the stone wall itself,
there is a thrilling position of encapsulation and surveying here is the opportunity to bathe
in hot water and have the windows open and a cool breeze run across your skin.
So really the home's goal was intended as a retreat from disembodiment that
the architecture was not about the stone and the wood and the proportions but it
was what those things did to you it was what they made you feel.
The act of being here in the house is just so centring it's so peaceful and
even though the view is the most significant thing upon arrival,
having spent time here it becomes the least it is really just a backdrop.
What the home is really trying to do is tune you towards the wind and the rain and the kānuka
I think the wonderful thing about a glass-sided house is your environment becomes part of your
living room the thing that was really important is that you did feel as equally comfortable on
the big sunny day with the doors flung open as you did on the stormy day with the doors
closed and you being curled up with a cup of coffee on the sofa the home was a vessel for
experiencing all of those things it was there to amplify what already existed.
I think there is a wonderful moment when the pavilion is in darkness and there is a flicker
of the flame at the base of the stone wall the home is made with real materials the stones the
woods the brass what we hope is in a hundred years those things have all got better and
what we hope is that nature has started to take the home back over that the home surfaces show
and reveal the history of the home's use that it will be better then than on day one
I think what I love most is this layered experience that whether it is the entry into
the seaward pavilion and the exposure that reveals or leaving it behind and finding the fisher in the
stone wall or clambering into the bath at every turn there is some slightly unexpected delight.
The thing I'm most proud of is actually felt at the time of departure,
upon your arrival here the view is everything when you leave the house I feel it's the
least significant I think this means the house is telling what it was intended.