K House is named Habitus House Of The Year 2021. A stunning south coast seaside residence.
We’re proud to have our projects featured in several national publications. Most recently, our feature in the book “Architecture at the Heart of the Home” and Houses and Habitus Magazine, where our project K House won the ‘Habitus House Of The Year 2021’. This project is atop the edge of NSW’s breathtaking and billowy south coast. This seaside residence for two is an exercise in essential architecture, which lavishes the individual with volume, light and views.
Habitus #52
- Gwinganna Ave
- Alice Blackwood
- Dianna Snape
- Renato D'Ettorre Architects
Perched atop the edge of NSW’s breathtaking and billowy south coast is K House. This seaside residence for two is an exercise in essential architecture, which lavishes the individual with volume, light and views.
It was the open horizons of ocean and sky, captivating in its clear-eyed blueness, equally stunning in a tempest, that captured the eye of the clients.
The house on the block had reached its use-by date but the land stood toe-to-toe with the cliff’s edge and called for a home that turned outwards as it turned in.
Renato D’Ettorre of Renato D’Ettorre Architects had the pleasurable challenge of doing the magnificent location justice, while working to a moderate budget. Rather than be limited by constraints, he focused on the opportunities at hand: knowledgeable clients who were very much present in the process, D’Ettorre’s appreciation of “good architecture” at its most essential, and of course the site.
Habitus #55
- Jacks Corner
- Gillian Seriser
- Tom Ferguson
- Intermode
When 5.5 million hectares of NSW were burned during the Black Summer fires, much of the Shoalhaven district was catastrophically affected. Many people lost their homes, including Andrew, who returned to find his 1980s cedar home and 40-year-old garden destroyed.
Arriving at the site with Andrew, Nick Carr, director of Intermode, felt the full weight of both privilege and responsibility for the project: “As we approached, Andrew’s car paused and I suddenly understood the emotional enormity of such devastation; we were really entering a disaster zone,” says Carr. Andrew’s home and garden had been utterly ravaged by the fires, but rather than up and move, he decided to rebuild. The experience instilled in Carr the sensitivity required to navigate the architecture. When asked about where to place the new dwelling, Carr’s reaction was: “He’s been there for 20 years; I’ve been there for 20 seconds.” This simple acknowledgement of Andrew’s relationship to the site created a foundation for the client and the Intermode design team to work together: “Andrew really had quite an involvement in his project. He lived in the old 1980s cedar building; he knew the site inside-out. And he knew exactly what he wanted to achieve with it,” says Carr.
