Rows End | Retallack Thompson

Rows End | Retallack Thompson | Photographer: Hamish McIntosh

2026 National Architecture Awards Program

Rows End | Retallack Thompson

Traditional Land Owners

Gadigal/ Eora Nation

Year
2026
Chapter

New South Wales

Category
Residential Architecture – Houses (Alterations and Additions)
Builder
Holmwood Constructions
Photographer
Hamish McIntosh
Media summary

The ubiquitous terrace house is an established typology; constrained in width, bound to only a few viable internal organisations and often restricted in their capacity for expansion. Rows End is a two storey dwelling at the end of a terrace row in Sydney's inner city. The project seeks to celebrate an alternative approach to heritage restoration, and exploit the anomaly of its siting.

With a series of distinctive interventions in galvanised plate and sectional steel the project makes considered interventions to maintain the fabric of the original terrace whilst opening up connections across rooms, to open spaces and daylight which would normally be impossible.

With a unique elevated deck to the rear, the project provides a robust, yet diaphanous armature for its inhabitants to enjoy the outdoors within the tree canopy of the neighbouring laneway. The open steel sections of the decking filter light to the living areas below.

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