Courtyard House by Rowan Opat
-
Pulled far back from the house you can see how the vault of the living room really opens up to the landscape. I'd bet this photo was taken from an oval of grass in the garden (Australian Rules Football demands to be played in an oval), and gives a pretty clear view of how expansive it feels inside.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Here's a peek into the garage and the circular drive, visible once you enter the front gate. Rowan told me that in siting the house he worked hard to keep tree removal down to just one. He also mentioned that the trees that surround the circular driveway do have one major drawback—aggressive lapwings, which are prone to attack once their eggs have been laid.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Viewed from the circular drive out front, the courtyard is the house's defining feature. With a shaded walk all the way around it, and a northward siting, the space makes use of passive solar techniques to remain temperate even in hot Victorian summers.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
With a hardworking solar array, the Courtyard House pumps energy back into the electric grid. The site also has an elaborate water filtration system which collects more than it uses, and that includes watering a massive garden.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
The entryway of the house, as seen from the garden, was devised as a kind of red carpet into the home. It looks great set against the black exterior. Just behind the entry is the black-clad water filtration system.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
The kitchen, living and dining rooms are the heart of the home. Once you make it down the long corridor you come into this wonderfully open space festooned with dangling lights and a vault of wooden slats. The whole space is well-wrought, but unfussy. I felt immediately at home.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
This is the master bathroom, which opens onto the courtyard to the left and back into the master bedroom to the right. I most loved the Japanese tub, in which one sits with the waterline up to their necks.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
This bathroom, which abuts the kitchen, also houses the laundry, which can be closed off behind tall white doors. Considering how removed the house is from its rural neighbors, bath time privacy is of little concern.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
The deck off the kitchen and dining room gets loads of use. As it's more visually connected to the common areas of the house, and the fact that it was an utterly splendid day when I visited, it actually feels more social to hang out there than in the courtyard. And with the garden in full bloom, it makes for one of the more verdant views on the property.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Here you can see the courtyard lit up at night. As Rowan puts it: "The Somers Courtyard House is modeled in the spirit of an antique Chinese courtyard house, which accommodates generations of families by providing a cluster of buildings around a central open space. Parts of the house are interconnected by the central courtyard including the sauna, garage, studio and a variety of outdoor covered living areas."Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
The bushland of the Mornington Peninsula is truly lovely, and this view from the deck off the main common areas looks straight out toward it. Though one of my ulterior motives for heading out of Melbourne was to see some Aussie fauna (koalas are common around here) I totally struck out. Too bad, as a mother and baby koala had been spotted on the property just a day before.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Set up on a concrete plinth and covered in large tiles, the fireplace actually acts as a thermal mass that helps keep things toasty in the cold Victorian winters. Unlike the region around Sydney, the Melbourne area has quite a drastic change in climate throughout the seasons. The steps you see in the foreground lead into a little antechamber (used as a nursery) and then the master bedroom.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
The roofline of the north-facing house (remember, this is the Southern Hemisphere, so facing north is the best way to maximize passive solar techniques) was designed to correspond with the angles of the summer and winter sun.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Rowan told me that he wanted "the radial-sawn timber cladding to act like a drape. Then the house would have these shapely openings, like keyholes." This view from the front shows how Rowan used the deep shadows not only as cooling devices, but as an actual aesthetic element of the house. The study of the play of shadows, I was happy to learn, is called sciagraphy.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
"Darker external colors integrate the house into the shadows of the surrounding bushland," Rowan said. "The courtyard is a lighter color to contrast with the exterior and make it feel a bit more like an interior to be within, even though it's outside." This idea of integrating into the landscape is one that Rowan took very seriously, hiring a sustainability consultant very early in the process to make maximum use of the site, the sun and the water the land collects.Photo by: Peter Bennetts -
Photo by: Peter Bennetts
Categories:
More
Adventures in Oz
Having admired a project by Shane Blue of Bourne + Blue Architecture in Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia, James and Sue O’Sullivan asked the architect to help them create a beachside…
Melbourne Convention Center
One element of my tour of Melbourne that really surprised me was how much I liked the new Melbourne Convention Center by Hamish Lyon of NH Architecture and Nik Karalis of Woods Bagot.
An Innovative Air Purifier
An ingenious filtration system keeps air clean through a set of cell-like modules and a network of tubes that harnesses the organic technology of plants.
Touring Sydney, Part 2
We featured bridges, beautiful low-income housing experiments, and beachside pools in our Touring Sydney, Part 1, slideshow and it would be remiss of us not to include the Australian city's most…
Add comment