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Photographs:Jason Frank Rothenberg
Text description provided by the architects. The design evolved as two buildings fanning out and around two established kanuka trees, the idea deriving from the underlying fan formation geology of the Moutere hills. The separate buildings reduce the bulk of the house as well as form a protected sunny courtyard to escape the strong north eastern breezes from Tasman Bay. The eccentric angles of the house are intended to reflect the forms of hop smokehouses found throughout the area. Western Red Cedar was chosen as an external wall cladding to naturally grey and tone with the adjacent hills and kanuka trees on site. It was also chosen a material to answer the clients brief requirements for a house suited to a rural NZ landscape and evoke an elegant farmhouse. Cedar was also used to the slatted screens that shade the rooms to the north and western sun and left to weather. The Main Front Door is solid laminated cedar with an inset pattern particular to this home.
The house sits off a narrow ridge and is set into the landscape in a series of long terraces developed with Wraight +Associates Landscape architects to merge the house, its terraces and immediate gardens with the wider farm landscape. Glue Laminated Lawson cypress columns and beams define the Main Living interior, with a hoop pine plywood ceiling lining and Matai flooring selected to evoke an rural home interior.
The house is self sufficient except for electricity incorporating a Biolytix sewerage system, solar hot water heating and collected stormwater.
