Bronte Sisters

Flexible multi-functional family living and privacy.

Bronte Sisters comprises two dwellings; a heritage listed house, previously renovated in 2011 by Andrew Burges Architects, and its neighbour, half of a pair of semi-detached dwellings.

 

 

As is often the case in heritage conservation areas, the requirement to retain heritage fabric necessitates the new building identity being revealed in the backyard.

The houses sit comfortably within this context. Retaining their individual characters to the street, original features have been restored and sympathetic designs for front fences and a carport have replaced former unsympathetic elements.

To the backyard the design positions the neighbouring houses in a dialogue through materiality and geometry; sharing DNA, but with their own identities.

Rear forms are conceived of as distinct from the existing fabric. Visually separate but sympathetic in scale and material, they read as monolithic forms, with openings bordered by wide steel heads, sills, jambs and pergolas.

On the larger building, these steel elements outline expansive corner openings that connect the building to the large deck flanking a shared yard and pool, or on the upper floor, framing the visual panorama of a view down to the ocean.

In the semi, similar detailing frames punched openings with directed views and windows set back to provide privacy between itself, the main house and neighbours.

A shared detail approach continues throughout with elements such as the curvilinear steel and hardwood pergolas echoed in internal joinery details and geometry. The external cladding is an important part of the dialogue between the houses, Belgian terracotta and cedar timber shingles speak a contemporary language that sits comfortably with timber cladding and terracotta tile extensions of surrounding buildings, the ageing timber shingles taking on the grey brown hues of hundred-year-old brick buildings

Our clients love the inside outside relationship and the connection that can be provided and modified to suit their day to day life.

Bronte Sisters Gallery

Project info	Details
Team	Sam Crawford, Jarad Grice, Liam Marosy-Weide, Ken Warr
Builder	Build By Design
Consultants	Structural Engineer: Partridge Landscape Architect: Spirit Level Heritage Consultant: Weir Phillips Mural Artist: Ash Holmes Interiors Selections: Mina Staples Design
Council	Waverley Council
Photographer	Brett Boardman
Awards	2023 Houses Awards – Shortlist for House Alteration and Addition over 200sqm 2023 Master Builders Association – Build By Design – Winner, House Alterations & Additions 2023 SPASA – KMD Outdoor Spaces – Gold Winner + National Finalist, Freeform Pool
Published	Habitus Living – May 2023 Grand Designs Australia Building Guide – 04
Completion	2022

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