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KUD principal Billy Kavellaris describes the house as
“calm and unassuming”. Vision’s Peter Hyatt spoke with
Kavellaris about a house of substance and light, gravity
and release.
How do you hope this house will be considered?
It can be read as a conversation of mass
and lightness, public and private, light and darkness.
From the street the house presents in two parts with a
central black void as grand entry. On the northern, or left
side is a solid, rigid, rectilinear form, seemingly weighed
down by its own mass. On the other, elevated from the
earth is a shard of glass symbolic of light.
VISION
BILLY KAVELLARIS
Your restrained material palette is a big part of the
answer and yet it feels like a house of contrasts.
It’s a monochromatic palette of off-white versus dense
black and highlighted timber. The tones are subtle but
rich. It’s a perfect counterpoint somewhere between
inside and out, cold and warmth, relaxed and active,
open and enclosed, the experience and experiment,
the old and the modern.
What appealed about these clients and this site?
This was an interesting house for us because the
client had a pretty open brief. Essentially they wanted us
to design them a house with a plan which they wanted to
get right from the beginning. So the program and the
utility of the house had to be right. But with respect to
the overall narrative and design concept, they left it
completely open. So it was a very interesting brief
because most clients have very specific views on what
they want in their house and in this case they said ‘do
what you want’ which is very, very rare. And a lot of
pressure as well.
A broad, north-facing eave, Viridian double-
glazed units and performance glass reconcile the
opportunities and thermal/solar challenges.