Venus Bay House

The Australian architects Welsh+Major use the tipycal local materials –  wood, fibre cement, metal sheet – for this beach house, with a spa in its 'heart'.

Venus Bay House
This house seeks to expand upon the ethos of a local beach house. Typically the houses of the area are timber framed, lined in fibre cement and metal sheet. They tend to either lie low nestled amongst the tea trees, or are set up on stilts to take advantage of local breezes and views.
Venus Bay House
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
This house is a bit of both –using familiar materials it sits perched on the crest of a small rise. More private areas of the house sit over the back of the ridge, whilst the rest of the house stretches along the western boundary towards the north. This arrangement creates an undercroft to the north, recreating the familiar drive in under/entry from below arrangement of the ‘up on stilts’ houses. 
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
When the roller shutter is up, the house is open for business: an informal entry via a boot room off the garage leads to an internal stair that pops up into the living spaces above.
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
Externally, the house reads as a volume wrapped up and over in metal sheet. At each end the house is closed off with prosaic fittings and materials as the programme requires: roller shutters, flyscreens and domestic aluminium windows-downpipes, gutters and fuse boxes, door tracks and light fittings are all pragmatically attached to the front and rear elevations. Fibre cement sheet is detailed in the traditional way of many beach houses, with battens covering the joints, all perched on unadorned concrete block retaining walls.
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House

Sections of the building’s volume are cut away as required for different reasons: on the east side to allow the existing tea trees to continue to grow unhindered, on the west, an outdoor spa room sits unannounced, hidden within the overall volume of the building.

Pragmatic and lightweight, bounced between extremes –of cold, heat, rain and wind– the house sits unadorned and honest, providing comfortable retreat to the people who use it.

 

Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House
Welsh + Major, Venus Bay House

House at Venus Bay, Victoria, Australia
Architects:
Welsh + Major
Design Team:
David Welsh, Christine Major, Steven Sheridan, Kevin Liu
Structural Engineer:
Deery Consulting Structural Engineer
Building Contractor:
Trease Builders
Site Area:
790 m2
Building Area: 160 m2
Completion: 2012
Photography:
Ben Hosking Photography

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