Our clients Les and Lana expressed a sentimentality for the Australian vernacular home; with its gable ends, raked eaves, exposed rafters, timber shingles and weatherboards, bay windows overlooking landscaped front yards.
This project came with a specific housing brief: twin double storey weatherboard houses, each with four bedrooms, a study and a retreat occupying a single site, 15m across in width.
Privacy screens, a common prefabricated feature across Melbourne’s inner suburbs, were specially custom designed for this project.
Deliberately eschewing the contemporary palette of materials and forms on the exterior, the effect on the street is to create two side by side houses in the vernacular expression. The interior is expressed in clean simplicity, with attention to materials and textures. We envisioned the interior to be a series of generous spaces, lots of light and extra high ceilings.
Subdivided into two deep lots, the strict setback and frontage controls and restricted building envelope called for a design with very efficient spatial planning and careful study of the setback requirements which would still allow for generous sized rooms, good natural lighting, ventilation and high ceilings.
Many different stakeholders contributed positively to the final outcome. Blending in amongst the visitors to the inspections when the properties were put up for sale, the feedback was positive and encouraging. Both houses have since been successfully sold upon completion.
Wee Mukai Architects 