Victoria
Located in Frankston South on Bunurong Country and backing onto Narringalling (Sweetwater Creek), Sweetwater House provides flexibility and sanctuary for our family of four. Designed and built during Melbourne’s Covid lockdowns, the home reflects an inventive response to low-cost, multigenerational living while telling a story of personal and ecological renewal.
Drawing on knowledge and experience gleaned from previous mass timber projects, the home was constructed using a prefabricated construction methodology.
Our ambition was to create a materially honest and highly sustainable home. We developed a plan arrangement that could adapt to the changing needs of two teenage children and allow for multi generational living. The gravitational heart is an open plan living room and kitchen overlooking the creek. Encircled by tree ferns and eucalypts, the home’s warm timber palette nurtures a sense of welcome and calm.
COLORBOND® Award for Steel Architecture
Botterill’s family home hosts a conceptual narrative that is architecturally intelligent whilst considering a deeply personal brief – both are compelling. A response to COVID-era supply chain interruptions resulted in a unique use of CLT construction – innovative in a residential context with the result creating a warm and deeply inviting frame with a natural timber interior. Botterill refines this system and successfully layers family life into its rigid dimensions, with intimate and generous spaces responding to needs for quiet and social alcoves that edge open spaces.
With its exterior wrapped in a pure galvanised steel facade, the siting and interface with the public and private realms has been dealt with in a simple and effective manner. The balance of privacy to the street yields a generous public meeting place for the local community and reveals a roof form that allows views to the Sweetwater creek – a local waterway that the Botterill family are restoring in an equally important civic gesture.
The raw use of materiality reveals every element is working hard, and careful detailing internally and externally creates an outcome that harmonises simple materials into a thought-provoking home.
Commendation for Residential Architecture – Houses (New)
Sweetwater House is a carefully crafted and thoroughly considered home for a young, dynamic family. Its thoughtful design approach is reflected in the rigour of the plan, the organisation of the spaces, and the precision of the construction methodology.
Adhering to a strict grid and datum, this project celebrates the constraints of working with CLT. While exploring ideas of proportion and scale, and the direct relationship this may have on the comfort of a space. This project is a balance between the personal, playful and rigour.
Moving to Frankston after living in Brunswick for the past 20 years was a seismic change for our family. Our vision was to create a home where everyone could find their place, a home that allowed us to come together, and entertain, or find moments of solitude.
The project has enabled us to translate 25 years of learning and insights, and a passion for sustainable design, into a home within which we can grow and evolve, while being immersed in a beautiful natural environment. It’s also been satisfying to design a building that reinforces the importance of designing for community.
Chris Botterill, Project Architect
Energy Lab, Energy Rater
RBS, Building Surveyor
Standstruct, CLT Panel Erection
Terramatrix, Fire Engineer
TNLA, Landscape Consultant
Vistek, Structural Engineer
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.
