“Elevated above the floodplain, and designed to withstand liquefaction, this house is greater than the sum of its engineering. The home uses materials in surprising and delightful ways, but manages to feel cohesive: making a virtue of a problem is one thing, but making it look effortless is quite another.” — Te Rōpū
It was on a socially distanced stroll during the first Covid lockdown that Dean Cowell and his whānau came across this site in Ōtautahi Christchurch. Covered in trees and fronted by two bare, red-zoned sections, it had unimpeded views across the Ōtākaro Avon River estuary, arcing from the Scarborough headland to the Port Hills, city and mountains beyond. “We weren’t looking for a project, but we found one,” recalls Cowell, a director at Three Sixty Architecture. “The only thing was, there was no guarantee we were going to be able to build on the land, because the site is on a flood plain. We pushed ahead anyway and figured that, worst-case scenario, we’d have a great picnic spot.”
Working through the process step by step, it took some hard graft to get the property across the line. Evaluating the ground conditions of Christchurch’s Te Karoro Karoro-Southshore Spit, you start to understand why. The narrow 2.5-kilometre stretch endured significant movement in the Christchurch earthquakes and is particularly vulnerable to the elements. Potentially at risk of rising sea levels, flooding, coastal erosion and the increasingly severe weather events brought on by climate change, Cowell’s design was constrained by stringent building regulations. To his credit, he took these in his stride. “I didn’t view them as challenges, but thought, ‘How can I use this to our advantage?’” says the architect. As a result, some of the home’s most compelling moments are born from these limitations.
Take the foundations. All new-builds in the flood plain require a minimum floor level of 1.8 metres, and most achieve this by being propped up on a clutter of poles and piles. “But I wanted to be able to use the space underneath the house,” explains Cowell. “So I went higher.” Lifting the floor to approximately 2.5 metres, he engineered a structural system with bigger but fewer concrete supports arranged beneath a concrete slab (cast in situ). The result is an extra 150 square metres of usable storage space and garaging underneath the house. Additional waved steel columns at the front and back of the home gently connect to the land, elevating the two stacked concrete and corrugated forms from the ground. “There’s a loose idea of a boat moored alongside a wharf,” the architect says of the design. “The house feels open on the underside, lightly touching down and moored to the more solid element of the garage/deck.”
In solving one issue, Cowell opened himself up to another. While the floor level had risen, the home’s height couldn’t increase to match. Addressing the concern pragmatically, the architect restricted the ceiling height in the upper bedroom level to allow more volume in the main living spaces below. Exposed rafters and the dining area’s double-height void give the illusion of a higher stud in the open-plan space where the living areas flow together, separated only by a wall of steel-and-glass doors. This arrangement nails the brief of “separate but together” that the Cowells and their two teenagers were aiming for, with the sole (glazed) internal wall giving the den an added sense of retreat without blocking morning light. “We can all have friends over and be in different spaces but still see what’s going on,” says Cowell. “It means the kids aren’t just escaping to their bedrooms.”
During the design phase, Cowell played with the idea of expanding the kitchen over the garage but landed on a generous deck instead. With an outdoor kitchen and fire, it functions as an extra living area, which the Cowells have already broken in with a 50-person party. The grated decking material is a fibre-reinforced plastic commonly used in heavy-duty walkways of industrial buildings; this was the architect’s first time using the material in a residential setting. “I like how it mimics the roughness of the exterior concrete block and how it glistens as the sun reflects off the glass in it,” he says. Visually, it breaks up the concrete-dense exterior, allowing sunlight to pass through to a garden below. Down here, a whitebait tree (named for its tendency to blossom during whitebait season) sits like an oversized pot plant, growing up through the deck. “It can grow up to five metres, so we’ll just cut pieces out of the deck with a jigsaw as the trunk gets thicker.”
A different profile of the commercial mesh runs along the northern face of the top storey, unifying the design and acting as a screen that obscures views in but not out. For added privacy, Cowell reduced the glazing over this level, using windows to frame unique views as you travel through it. In the main bedroom, however, he threw caution to the wind with full-width glazing to capture that winning panorama. “The only way we could glaze the whole face was by keeping the ensuite small,” explains Cowell. “So we had to bring the bath out into the bedroom.” A relatively luxurious sacrifice.
The home’s layout demonstrates the architect’s skill of capitalising on the in-between areas. Nothing is wasted, with the upstairs landing and hallways sectioned off in a separate reading nook, workstation and office/music area – all of which can evolve with the whānau’s needs. The same formula applies in the garden. Designed in conjunction with Botanic Landscape Architects, the structured layout – partially informed by the shape of the house – is softened by coastal planting.
There’s a firepit, hot tub and neat sheltered spot beneath the overhang of the home that captures the afternoon sun. A small manicured lawn is squared off to one side, but the Cowells didn’t get too carried away with grass as their back gate connects to the meadow-like red zone. Dotted with remnant plantings from old home gardens, the council plans to tidy the landscaping and establish a walkway out here. In the meantime, locals are giving it a go. “Some plant gardens or vegetables. If you just look after the little space in front of you, everyone’s happy,” says Cowell. “Although you know when they’ve taken it a bit far because the council turns up with diggers.”
It’s an undeniably innovative piece of contemporary architecture, but there’s also a casualness to the home that’s entirely befitting of family life and the beachside locale. Its brutal exterior, designed to withstand the elements, is softened by an interior of warm materials (note no plasterboard walls) and texture. Subtle design references to the 1960s and 70s are seen in the choice of colour, materials and the minimalist form. But it reads as relaxed, rather than retro. “We wanted it to feel beachy,” Cowell says. “And it does; it feels very retreated from the city… even though we can see it through the window.”
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