Smee Schoff House

Engaged clients and site constraints generate unique design.

This project is a great example of how dedicated and engaged clients together with a challenging set of site constraints make for a rich and unique design outcome.

 

 

Our clients have a wonderful art collection, and their own unique style, which contributed to the industrial/craft aesthetic of the new work.

Recycled bricks are used extensively for environmental and aesthetic reasons, on both internal (painted) and external (bare-faced) walls. Black painted, lightweight steel-framed windows and doors accentuate the very tall brick walls of the central court and dining room. Exposed, oversized recycled timber beams scale the 4.5m high ceiling of the dining space. Timbers recycled from demolished portions of the building and our client’s cherished Scandinavian hand-painted ceramic tiles are incorporated into new joinery work.

A lightweight screen of plywood, laser-cut in a pattern derived from the hand-painted tiles separates the kitchen and dining rooms.

The design sits on a clear continuum of our work, of pushing for maximum thermal comfort with minimal ongoing energy use. This involves a relatively large upfront cost, in the provision of substantial thermal mass via exposed concrete slab floors and brick and reverse brick veneer wall construction, coupled with solar powered and gas boosted hydronic underfloor heating, contributing to ongoing and long term energy savings. A central courtyard, between the old and new, provides winter sun to otherwise south-facing living areas.

The construction team from Buildability, led by foreman Matt Raap, were a major factor in the success of the project.

Smee Schoff House Gallery

Plans

Project info	Details
Team	Sam Crawford, Karen Erdos, Lionel Teh
Builder	Buildability
Consultants	Landscape – Hugh Main, Spirit Level Structural Engineer – James Sutherland, Northrop Quantity Surveyor – Matt Saunderson, QS Plus Hydraulic Engineer – Northrop Land Surveyor – Hill & Blume
Council	Marrickville
Photographer	Brett Boardman
Awards	2012 AIA National Architecture Awards – Commendation 2012 AIA NSW Residential Architecture Award 2014 Marrickville Medal – Commendation
Published	Materiality: Brick and Block in Australian Contemporary Australian Architecture, 2015 Monument (Issue 104) August/Sept, 2011 Home Beautiful September 2011
Completion	2010

---