Ronnen Goren and Trace Streeter bought 20 acres in central Victoria, just six minutes north of the spa town of Daylesford, with the aim of creating a rural enclave where they could farm, garden, and host visitors via a cooking school and reception venue. “One is an ex-farmer and part-time hairdresser, and the other is a design executive and brilliant cook,” says architect Timothy Hill, design director at Partners Hill—and Goren’s friend of 30 years. “The goal was to invent a project and a way of living that would enable their instinctual interests and capacities to flourish in a generous way.”

The first thing Hill noticed when he visited the site was that he was wearing the wrong suit. “I had travelled from London and arrived on the site in a light summer suit. I remember, vividly, the howling wind and its bone-chilling unpredictability,” he says. “Apart from the weather, there was evident attack from wallabies, kangaroos, cockatoos, echidnas, and foxes.”

With such extremes in climate, threats from wildlife, and less-than-hospitable growing conditions, the land was hostile to the couple’s goals. Hill’s solution was to collect the diverse site functions under a single roof. “Something defensive was required that would enable the natural order to persist but allow a protected intervention,” says Hill.

The monumental roof also helps collect water. “One big roof facilitates one big enabling characteristic: the capacity to gather enough water to survive through the year and to nourish features exceptional to the conditions,” says Hill. The 1,050-square-meter roof harvests rainwater and collects it in 340,000-liter tanks, used for the couple’s personal residence, the gardens, the cooking school, and potentially to fight fires.

Hill’s decision to shelter everything under one roof rather than spread agricultural functions across separate outbuildings is a nod to the Palladian tradition of “including living, working, storing, and making in a single suite rather than referring to the Australian habit of casual dispersal.”

“In this case, it enabled gentile circulation between the various necessities of farm life,” says Hill. “In a howling winter evening storm, a check on all the other living organisms can be comfortably conducted in a pair of socks. Why not enjoy being in the landscape rather than be required to defend yourself from it as one plods from outpost to outpost?”

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Project Credits:

Architecture: Partners Hill / @partnershill

Builder: Nick Andrews Construction

Structural Engineer: Tim Hall and Associates

Civil Engineer: Tim Hall and Associates

Landscape Design: Partners Hill

Lighting Design: Partners Hill

Interior Design: Partners Hill

Cabinetry Design and Installation: Partners Hill and Nick Andrews Construction

Elvis and Rose Masonary

Passive Haus Engineer