Woollahra Village House is an immaculately designed home in the suburb’s heritage zone, sandwiched between two Victorian terraces. While not heritage itself, the almost complete knockdown and rebuild is a standout. The absolute delight in this design by Tobias Partners is that at every step, and in every space, you’re engulfed in material and light.

Everything but the existing mock-Georgian front façade and front roof pitch has been demolished and replaced with a three-bedroom light-filled home with easy navigation that’s equipped to accommodate the owners well into their twilight years. The clients’ request not to overdevelop the site was refreshing and relatively rare for a rebuild on a tight suburban site:

“Working on a small scale like this, it was hugely enjoyable… it’s not often that we get the opportunity to say let’s not do that extra storey, let’s keep it slightly more humble,” says Matthew Krusin, Principal, Tobias Partners.

Keeping it to two storeys encouraged a simple, yet thoughtful, design using a pitched roofing system, with a low roof in between, containing two bedrooms upstairs (both with ensuites), and an open plan kitchen, living and dining room downstairs opening onto a garden courtyard. A loft studio space above the garage (with rear lane entry) contains the third bedroom, a bathroom and kitchenette, designed for a carer in the years to come, and also perfect for guests.

The clever use of highlight windows on the front pitched roof on both ensuites attracts an abundance of light and cross ventilation throughout the day. Large Oak skylights in the main house and garage also achieve this aim and more, capturing changing views of the owners’ beloved Chinese Tallow tree as well as neighbouring Plane trees, bringing dappled light and shadows into the spaces all year.

The tranquil courtyard garden nestled between the two buildings is a design standout. In the centre is the Chinese Tallow tree, not only wonderful to look at, but delivering shade in summer to the west-facing garden, a beautiful show of leaves in autumn and, being deciduous, fills the garden with northern light and sun during winter.

It’s also in the garden courtyard that the brilliant combination of materials in the palette come into harmonious play, displayed in 360° view and creating almost a whole other world. Handmade Petersen Kolumba™ bricks and Blackbutt dominate, paired with zinc, painted steel accents and off-form concrete. It is incredible to see so many materials working seamlessly on such a small scale.

“We have a coming together of all these materials but in a fairly small area and it’s really nice that they actually work together and they feel very quiet as a material palette, even though there are a lot of them. That’s the first thing we said as a team that works really well,” remarks Matthew.

Tobias Partners has used handmade Petersen Kolumba (K91) bricks on two Sydney projects, Deepwater and Lavender Bay. At Woollahra Village House, they’re used extensively on the boundary walls, striking flanking walls on the studio loft building and on a low perching wall at the end of the lawn.

“We wanted a lot of texture in that garden to give it a sense of difference. We’ve used the Petersen Kolumba brick before in two other projects in Sydney, so we knew how much we loved the brick with its beautiful proportions and texture… we wanted to engulf the garden in the Petersen brick,” comments Matthew.

So many positive comments about the house are from people seeing the bricks in the rear lane, care of the flanking walls that come up from the lane, then go up, over and back down into the garden.

“What’s so nice about this particular Petersen is we’ve used a lot of it in what isn’t a huge garden. And yet it never feels like you’ve used too much of it, because it is so delicate in texture. It’s somewhere between a stone and a concrete. You can use it in abundance and it doesn’t feel that you’ve overused it, it’s quite wonderful and we’re really happy with it,” says Matthew.

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Creating the flanking walls was a huge undertaking, but incredibly exciting and rewarding. The walls had to contain zinc roofing and steel portals, so they’re as wide as the width of the brick, and as they pitch back away, they sit on steel trays, which contain pins to connect the steel hoods and zinc roof. It’s an ingenious, well-crafted solution.

“Michael, the boss of Cumberland Build, was doing hand sketches to work out how the steel hoods would connect into the brickwork, we were trying to work it out in finessing detail, the bricklayers were working out how to lay the bricks onto the structure, and the engineer was telling us how often we needed support for the bricks. It was a great team effort and a lot of fun,” recalls Matthew.

The bricklaying is a masterpiece, care of J&O Bricklaying. The flanking walls are laid as full brick followed by half brick, stack bonds are used on the parapets that run up on the flanking walls, and on the faces a random bond, repeated every six courses, creates that much-loved, highly textured look. The intensive exercise to get the bricks laid and looking good more than paid dividends.

As you stand in the courtyard, the combination of materials and the simplicity of each elevation is breathtaking: The rear building with its quadrant of Petersen bricks, steel portals, zinc roofing and timber slats, and the main building with its timeless Blackbutt and concrete. Altogether, on such a small scale, the palette engulfs you, making the space feel truly intimate.

“You always think it’s going to be great and then when it comes together and the textures – the Blackbutt and the Petersen especially – make it look better than any concept you could render. Once the light hits them and even when the light isn’t hitting them, with the brick, it textures immediately. The steel and zinc are also there because that allowed the little bits of concrete, the Petersen and Blackbutt to really shine,” says Matthew.

Tobias Partners is to be congratulated for creating a modern masterpiece with timeless appeal that will, indeed, be enjoyed by the owners well into their twilight years. Meticulously and thoughtfully planned, at every point, from its front mock-Georgian façade, to the highly textured courtyard garden and unforgettable laneway presence, there is a great sense of interest at every turn.

“Working on a scale like this was hugely enjoyable, working with all of these materials for a wonderful client, I couldn’t be happier,” concludes Matthew.

Project details

Project: Woollahra Village House

Architect: Tobias Partners

Builder: Cumberland Build

Landscape Design: Myles Baldwin Design

Bricklayer: J&O Bricklaying

Product: Petersen K91 Bricks

Photography: Justin Alexander

Architecture & Design Team

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