Architecture
Homes Open Up in Unexpected Ways
Sometimes a door can be more than a door: as these homes show, introducing mechanisms to your design can make a house both practical and fun
I wouldn’t say I’m handy: I’m not one of those people who knows how to fix a car engine or, as a kid, took apart a remote control to see if they could make it better. But I’ve always liked the process of seeing how something worked; to see how things move. I love those domino displays that take months to set up and only a minute for all the dominoes to fall – all shot in a continuous video you can view over and over. You get to sit and just watch the action unfold.
Architecture can offer the opportunity to see how things work on a large scale, and it can be quite delightful. The best are often grand gestures which seem simple, but can greatly alter the look and feel of the space.
Architecture can offer the opportunity to see how things work on a large scale, and it can be quite delightful. The best are often grand gestures which seem simple, but can greatly alter the look and feel of the space.
In keeping with the rest of the design – which features vintage shower fittings and a rustic timber interior – the handle you wind to make it all happen has an industrial aesthetic, mixed with an element of mystery.
Begging to be turned, it seems unbelievable the entire wall is going to move.
Begging to be turned, it seems unbelievable the entire wall is going to move.
And yet it does. You start to get a glimpse of the hinges being used and the framework which is taking the weight of the door. Watch out, you don’t want to hit your head!
See more of this house
See more of this house
In the breeze
What about something a little more glassy? Strachan Group Architects’ Boat Sheds are an elegant surprise – the house is designed to operate like a boat, with large windows and openings that slide up and down to catch the breeze. The owners – a family of sailors who live near Auckland’s Takapuna Beach – are in tune with the sun and the wind, and the house operates the same.
What about something a little more glassy? Strachan Group Architects’ Boat Sheds are an elegant surprise – the house is designed to operate like a boat, with large windows and openings that slide up and down to catch the breeze. The owners – a family of sailors who live near Auckland’s Takapuna Beach – are in tune with the sun and the wind, and the house operates the same.
Here in the dining room, you can see the huge glass door that slides up on hydraulics, effectively making the room part of the outside terrace. The sheer size of the opening is spectacular: a whole wall opens, effortlessly dragging in the breeze.
In the next ‘boat shed over’ these oversized pivot doors are another celebration of machinery: when open they offer a grand connection to the pool – which just so happens to cool the air as it flows into the house. The window above, meanwhile – in the master bedroom – drops down to form a balustrade, while the steel fins can be moved back and forth to open or close the room to the breeze. So easy – I love it.
See more of this house
See more of this house
Art work
Architect Pip Cheshire’s Stringer House – designed for the sculptor Terry Stringer more than 20 years ago – has a hulking, broken form that looks like a sculpture in and of itself. The combination of forms and their placement in the landscape invites intrigue and further inspection.
Its interior is just as beautiful: instead of fixed walls in the gallery space, it has internal walls that turn and move to allow for different layouts of the artworks it houses.
Architect Pip Cheshire’s Stringer House – designed for the sculptor Terry Stringer more than 20 years ago – has a hulking, broken form that looks like a sculpture in and of itself. The combination of forms and their placement in the landscape invites intrigue and further inspection.
Its interior is just as beautiful: instead of fixed walls in the gallery space, it has internal walls that turn and move to allow for different layouts of the artworks it houses.
A view of the interior walls: all in line, ready to swivel to create a perpendicular layout.
Because these walls are moveable, they allow many different opportunities for the artwork to be situated, much more than if they were fixed in place. It’s not just a nice touch – though it is a lot of fun: the gallery acts as though it is many times the size.
Because these walls are moveable, they allow many different opportunities for the artwork to be situated, much more than if they were fixed in place. It’s not just a nice touch – though it is a lot of fun: the gallery acts as though it is many times the size.
New York state
To New York now and the conversion of an 1840s Greek Revival townhouse in Greenwich Village by BWArchitects. It might not look like it, but the renovation fused past and present by both drawing on the house’s history and using modern, high-tech materials – including low-VOC paints and highly efficient heating and cooling mechanisms. As a result, the house is just one of six single family homes to become certified by the US Green Building Council in New York City.
To New York now and the conversion of an 1840s Greek Revival townhouse in Greenwich Village by BWArchitects. It might not look like it, but the renovation fused past and present by both drawing on the house’s history and using modern, high-tech materials – including low-VOC paints and highly efficient heating and cooling mechanisms. As a result, the house is just one of six single family homes to become certified by the US Green Building Council in New York City.
Some of the tech is straight out of the 19th century, but it’s been put to use in a thoroughly modern way. You know something good is on the cards with this many cogs on display and nowhere is this more true than with the mechanism that opens the fourth-floor skylight, which is part of a passive cooling system that brings cooler air in from the basement through huge steel-framed windows: the air then flows up the staircase and out through the skylight on the top floor. The skylight acts in reverse, too, dropping light down through the middle of the house.
Here’s the big reveal, a huge steel-framed window – showing some of the most environmentally friendly systems are often the most basic.
It has other benefits, too – in this kind of loft room you can constantly feel as though you are too big for the space, but with the window open the room seems generous and a comfortable place to work.
See more of this townhouse
It has other benefits, too – in this kind of loft room you can constantly feel as though you are too big for the space, but with the window open the room seems generous and a comfortable place to work.
See more of this townhouse
Cabin fever
You’ve probably heard of Tom Kundig, the American architect based in Seattle with a penchant for beautifully crafted buildings made from timber and steel – and which often celebrate mechanisms.
The False Bay Writer’s Cabin is a personal favourite of mine. One minute it appears so quiet and delicate. It waits, all secure, ready to be woken up.
You’ve probably heard of Tom Kundig, the American architect based in Seattle with a penchant for beautifully crafted buildings made from timber and steel – and which often celebrate mechanisms.
The False Bay Writer’s Cabin is a personal favourite of mine. One minute it appears so quiet and delicate. It waits, all secure, ready to be woken up.
Then the walls of the cabin fold down, allowing views and creating a porch. It is a real performance, as through you are welcomed to a small castle with a drawbridge coming down. Now ready to go, with all the walls relaxed to form decks, it helps to make the house feel more at one with the site. The house literally unfolds into the landscape.
Container for living
Back in New Zealand, and again to the Coromandel Peninsula, Ken Crosson shows he has a similar penchant for mechanism. When not in use, his bach on a hill looking out to the Mercury Islands is all tidied away, just a simple timber clad box that looks a bit like a shipping container. It is a nicely secure holiday home that protects the interior from sun and wind – and unwanted visitors.
Back in New Zealand, and again to the Coromandel Peninsula, Ken Crosson shows he has a similar penchant for mechanism. When not in use, his bach on a hill looking out to the Mercury Islands is all tidied away, just a simple timber clad box that looks a bit like a shipping container. It is a nicely secure holiday home that protects the interior from sun and wind – and unwanted visitors.
But when Crosson returns, he drops the sides down to become decks on either side, exposing a beautiful contrast between the weathered exterior and the golden timber of the inside. The home calms and becomes instantly welcoming – looking out over a spectacular view. A breeze can flow easily through the home and it is well connected to the land.
Take a look inside
Take a look inside
The fun doesn’t stop there, though. Thanks to a clawfoot bath on wheels – which rolls out of the bathroom and onto the deck – occupants of the house can enjoy that view while taking a bath.
TELL US
Which of these do you like best? Share your favourite in the Comments below.
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Browse 100 of the Best New Zealand Homes on Houzz
TELL US
Which of these do you like best? Share your favourite in the Comments below.
MORE
Browse 100 of the Best New Zealand Homes on Houzz
You could open a window. Or you could open a WALL! The double-height face of this beach house by Crosson Clarke Carnachan Architects opens right up to form a sun shade, while bathing the interior of the beach house in light.
It’s a lovely touch, but also practical – the hut was designed as a prototype at Whangapoua Beach on New Zealand’s Coromandel Peninsula. The section is sandy and unstable, and didn’t permit a proper house: the hut is designed so that it can be moved (with the aid of a tractor).