somers house

10a. SOMERS HOUSE

This project involved the refurbishment of an existing house, a new verandah link and a new building (a ‘parents wing’) on a 50 acre property in Somers, a coastal area on Westernport Bay, approximately 70km from Melbourne.

The project is one of many in the ongoing management of the property by the clients, including infrastructural and environmental initiatives, water storage, tree plantings, the farming of sheep, etc.

The site is quite exposed, with strong coastal winds. It is next to Coolart Homestead and is accessed from the original homestead driveway. Coolart is a historic farming property and coastal reserve with walking tracks and internationally significant wetlands.

Our approach has been to treat the site as part of the Coolart Homestead and coastal environment and the new elements are additions to this large-scale landscape. The new building takes its form, contents, technology and materials from different parts of the site.

It is not immediately apparent which parts are new and which are old.

Rather than enlarging the house and making it more dominant, a deliberate 'anonymity' in the new form maintains a type of evenness between all the parts: sheds, house, dams, trees...

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FARM

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A new verandah is added to the existing house and with the new building make a courtyard space on the south side of the house. The verandah is a reworking of the entry sequence opening the house towards the property and also links the separate building to the house.

The thin galvanized steel angle columns of the structure are utilitarian steel sections similar to the structure of the tank stand.

Entering the new building from the verandah, a series of external spaces are contained within the volume and change orientation as you move through them. Having the outside spaces on the inside allows them to act as environmental and privacy buffer-zones. Doors and openable windows to the inside are accessed from these protected spaces.

HOUSE / SHIFT

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The building can be opened and closed, depending on its occupation and the weather.

It is not clear to an observer what happens inside - or what is inside and what is outside - and this anonymous quality is something in common with other rural structures nearby.

The building sits quite crudely on the ground. It doesn't actually touch, but it certainly doesn't 'float'. There is an avoidance of dealing with unnecessary dressing (of the base), thinking about the economy and rawness of industrial buildings‌ removing rather than adding.

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SHED / CLOSED

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The structure is a repetitive timber frame of trusses and purlins, which has the evenness of a utilitarian structure. There are no lintels for large openings. Structural members remain continuous in each bay. The structure includes dressed posts connected by steel plates, with tension rod bottom chords to each truss.

Interiors are lined in plywood, which conceals some structural elements and reveals others. The process of covering and revealing the frame makes the enclosure, and the regular columns appear at moments through the openings.

The building is divided into discrete rooms in both plan and section. Some tall and some low. This allows the single volume to be occupied as a living space. The rooms are arranged in pairs. A radiating geometry adjusts the focus of each room. This results in the orientation of the black outdoor room being directed towards the dam.

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FRAME / STRUCTURE / DIVISION

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Cladding is laid over the frame and different openings made for the spaces. The cladding is put together with a careful use of conventional methods and the windows are treated as part of the sheet metal cladding surface. Details were studied from other rural and industrial buildings.

The internal surface is uniformly plywood, finished in oil/ white stain/ black stain. The external surface is 'armour grey' colorbond sheet, which approximates the colour of the aged galvansied cladding of the nearby shed. This colour is neutral like an undercoat, emphasising the more high-contrast interior surfaces and changing tone with the sky.

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LAYERS

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Somers House NMBW Architecture Studio 2002 - 2004 Project Team Nigel Bertram Lucinda McLean Marika Neustupny First published Architecture Australia Vol. 93 No.1 Jan/Feb 2004 pp.72-77 review: Mauro Baracco + Louise Wright Stadt Bauwelt Special Issue on Melbourne No.168, December 2005 Cover image The Age Wednesday June 16, 2004, p.6 (Domain section) review: Anne Pilmer Awards Best Building Conversion Award South East Development, Architectural Excellence in the South-East Awards, 2005 Photography NMBW

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