Anglesea Passive House by Zen Architects establishes a resonant built and design equilibrium in its seamless unification of architecture, context and environment. Within its striking native coastal landscape, the residence considers each as a sum of a whole to cultivate a home that is as holistically efficient as it is beautiful.
Inside, Anglesea Passive House harbours an atmosphere of covert luminosity. The elements are coaxed from outside in as sunlight sabres through the exterior screening and the cinematic shadow-play captures foliage dancing across surfaces of cork, steel and concrete. The vertical timber cladding also continues inside, extending up the staircase and wrapping joinery to instil a sense of detailed refinement. From the living areas, sightlines extend perfectly between the upper and lower tree canopies to foster far-reaching views across the water to lend an impression of immediacy.
Acting as an access point between the ground and first floors, the landscape provides an alternative entry to the ground floor when the internal stairs prove difficult for a resident in their 90s. While living, kitchen a bathroom and primary bedroom are contained within the first floor which continues from the road level, below are two further bedrooms, one which doubles as an art studio and the other a study, and a bathroom.
Shaped by clients with both passive and architectural intentions (this is their fourth architecturally led project), the residence has emerged as a reconciliation of both, which has naturally cultivated a place that is profoundly contextual, integrated gently into the native bushland landscape of Victoria’s surf coast.
Downsizing from a 10-acre+ property further inland to the 1,165 sqm site, the clients — a couple in their senior years — were after a home that would address the ageing-in-place dialogue and harness views of nearby Pt Roadnight Beach. Throughout its 200sqm, double-storey foot-print, Anglesea Passive House is distinguished by its ease of navigation, the agility of its programming and an emphasis on framing views in a way that gives the impression that the beach rests at the end of a leisurely walk through the garden and beyond.
Via a dedication to retaining as many existing trees as possible while ensuring the property strictly adheres to a BAL 29 bushfire rating, the footprint has been devised to mediate between safety and retention of the surrounding biodiversity to sit into the contours of the land, burying within at one end while cantilevering at the other slightly to hover above the surface of the landscape which tapers down towards the beach. Continuing the linear pattern language of the surrounding trees, the facade is defined by vertical timber screening which surrounds a precise, rectangular volume bisected by steel framing that protrudes from the exterior to give the impression of solidity in balance with the elemental context. In an effort to design a house that was as low-carbon as possible, the reclaimed and recycled timber and steel construction, which sits above ground while below is concrete, provides a lightweight design in accord with the expressions of the environment. A layer of ironbark and turpentine encases an interior of lighter-hued tallow wood to render a building of cohesion and ordered beauty.
Inside, Anglesea Passive House harbours an atmosphere of covert luminosity. The elements are coaxed from outside in as sunlight sabres through the exterior screening, and the cinematic shadow play captures foliage dancing across surfaces of cork, steel, and concrete. The vertical timber cladding also continues inside, extending up the staircase and wrapping joinery to instil a sense of detailed refinement. From the living areas, sightlines extend perfectly between the upper and lower tree canopies to foster far-reaching views across the water to lend an impression of immediacy.
Acting as an access point between the ground and first floors, the landscape provides an alternative entry to the ground floor when the internal stairs prove difficult for a resident in their 90s. While living, kitchen, bathroom, and primary bedroom are contained within the first floor, which continues from the road level, below are two further bedrooms, one of which doubles as an art studio and the other a study and a bathroom.
Anglesea Passive House is humble in its residential offering yet inherently rich in atmosphere, aesthetics and sustainability. In taking those qualities of passive house design — orientation, air tightness, thermal insulation, high-performance windows and mechanical ventilation heat recovery — and devising ways to achieve them in a design-led way, Zen Architects has been able to demonstrate the importance of builder/architect collaboration in realising homes deeply in tune with all the rituals of living unique to inhabitants, homes that rest lightly upon the ecosystems they rest within and are able to intuitively balance striking aesthetics alongside sensitivity to their built and natural surroundings.
