Wooloowin House

Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick

WOOLOOWIN HOUSE

Nielsen Jenkins

LOCATION
Brisbane, Australia

CATEGORY
Houses

AREA
300 m²

ARCHITECTS
Nielsen Jenkins

YEAR
2019

PHOTOGRAPHS
Shantanu Starick

ENGINEERING
Ad. Structure, Ad Structure

MANUFACTURERS
Autodesk, Breezway, Brodware, Pgh Bricks, Timberware, Adobe, Grillworks, Slab Shapers, Trimble

LANDSCAPE
Sanctuary Landscapes, Simon Hill

CONSULTANTS
Place Design Group

DESIGN TEAM
Lachlan Nielsen, Morgan Jenkins, Nicholas Russell, Kelsey Homer, Laura Mcconaghy

CLIENTS
Simon Hill, Rachel Hill

LANDSCAPE DESIGN
Jonathan Kopinski, Nielsen Jenkins

BUILDER
Builder

Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick

Text description provided by architect.

The Wooloowin House sits on a very steep, west facing site with distant views towards the Samford Valley.

The inherent tension between the distant mountain view and the ferocity of the summer sun from this direction led to a strategy of enabling a much more dynamic occupation of the site than is typical in these buildings.

Two new 'public' rooms have been created; one internal room has been carved away through careful subtraction within the existing building envelope.

Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick

And the other external room has been defined by the addition of a new framing arbour to the west, and a slender two-storey screening element to the south which shields the existing pool from the neighbouring block of units.

The project stitches together small additions with the existing structure, slab, pool and roof.

Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick

This new arrangement has enabled a new series of grounded spaces that allow the family to occupy different parts of the site at different times of the day – retreating back into the undercroft spaces when the sun is at its harshest, and then moving outwards to the view as the sun turns to night.

Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick


Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick
Wooloowin House
© Shantanu Starick


Wooloowin House
Section
Wooloowin House
Section B


Wooloowin House
Ground floor plan
Wooloowin House
First floor plan