Wurundjeri
Victoria
Graeme Gunn originally designed this house for John Ridge, who with David Yencken founded Merchant Builders. Key elements of the Merchant Builder house are evident – courtyard planning, a balanced relationship between interior and garden, an emphasis on native Australian plants, expressive structure, a reduced construction palette, textural materiality, passive solar design and a serious investigation of a modern Australian vernacular. While the house doesn’t have heritage protection it certainly should, and our strategy was to approach the design as if it had. We proposed precise interventions alongside restoration of the original fabric including an eccentric black timber skillion form, a new childrens’ wing and a complex west-facing terrace incorporating planted zones. Our design also adds moments of craft and intensity, generous apertures, clarifies complexity and proposes freshness using colour and materiality which represents the personalities and tastes of the current owners.
Homes pass from family to family, each new caretaker adding their imprint over time, they evolve to successive changes in the way we live. In this way the heritage of a house is like history itself, a continuum made up of overlapping layers. The Gunn Ridge House however, has a richer back story than most homes. Kennedy Nolan have partnered with the current owners to extend a dialogue with the original house designed by Graeme Gunn for John Ridge, with interiors by Jan Faulkner and garden design by Ellis Stone.
Kennedy Nolan’s design is simultaneously sensitive and bold. It shifts from subtle interventions to elements that enhance and reimagine the original building fabric through to additions that are bold and easily discernible. It is a conversational approach to heritage, one that politely compliments the good, makes thoughtful suggestions where needed and bold arguments for change where necessary.
Rachel Nolan, Design Architect
Patrick Kennedy, Design Architect
Dominic Wells, Project Architect
Marnie Morieson, Project Architect
Hugh Goad, Architect
Snyders Engineers, Structural Engineer
Fiona Brockhoff, Landscape Consultant
The Australian Institute of Architects acknowledges First Nations peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the lands, waters, and skies of the continent now called Australia.
We express our gratitude to their Elders and Knowledge Holders whose wisdom, actions and knowledge have kept culture alive.
We recognise First Nations peoples as the first architects and builders. We appreciate their continuing work on Country from pre-invasion times to contemporary First Nations architects, and respect their rights to continue to care for Country.
