With its tall silhouette, narrow upper window, and blank face, this house in the Auckland suburb of Waterview could almost be a utility building, were it not covered in cedar weatherboards.

Architect Andrew Lister designed the wedge-shaped building for actor Yuri Kinugawa and film producer Owen Hughes, with a high ceiling stud, open-plan interior, and a deck flush with the ground floor, based on the principles of the Direct Compass, a Japanese discipline related to feng shui.

The building’s dimensions are simple yet very precise. “It is basically two boxes joined by a passage and a bathroom hanging off it,” says Hughes. “It’s not a big house by any stretch of the imagination, but people think it is.”