- Service
- New build
- Size
- 312 m²
- Duration
- 9 months
- Completed
- [YEAR]
The brief
What the owners were trying to solve.
The owners had a wide but shallow block with the only usable outdoor space at the rear, facing north. Their previous house had the living areas at the front, and they had spent ten years walking past the good part of the site to get to a dark lounge room.
The requirement was simple to state and harder to build: put every living space at the back, get as much northern light into them as possible, and do it without the house overheating in summer or overlooking the neighbours.
What we built
- Waffle-pod slab and engineered frame. Set out to a 5 mm tolerance across a 24-metre run so the rear glazing lines could stay true.
- Full-height rear glazing. Six-metre stacking doors with a concealed head detail, and a 900 mm eave sized to shade them in summer.
- Suspended first floor. Steel transfer beam over the living space to keep the ground floor free of columns.
- Blade wall and screening. Angled privacy screening to the upper-level windows to resolve the overlooking constraint at approval stage.
Gallery
Marden Street Residence.
The part that was not straightforward
The bit that decided the program.
The transfer beam carrying the first floor over the open living space was the whole job in one element. It had to be craned in over an established neighbouring tree that could not be touched, on a block with a 3.1 metre side setback.
We booked a smaller crane with a longer reach rather than the obvious one, worked out the lift on paper with the engineer two months before it was needed, and did it on a Saturday morning to keep the street clear. The lift took ninety minutes. Getting it right on paper took considerably longer, which is the point.
“We got three quotes. Bhuran's was not the cheapest, but it was the only one that listed what was not included. Eight months later the final invoice matched the contract to the dollar.”
Service used
Residential New Builds
More work
Related projects.
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