Brunswick East Residence by Studio Amble.
Architecture, Design - by Tiffany Jade
21st September, 2022
Balancing architecture, interior design and landscape design, Brunswick East Residence orchestrates an accord between the three. The renovated Victorian Terrace harmoniously mediates between disciplines to demonstrate Studio Amble’s propensity for realising places that respond equally to relevance, ritual and context.
Bookended by the densely colourful milieu of Brunswick and Northcote’s village atmosphere, Brunswick East is a paradigm of Melbourne’s inner north mediating between hyper-connectivity and continual opportunities to pause in nature. Its built environment is a tapestry of myriad housing types with the Victorian Terrace dominating. Like many, Brunswick East Residence is one such terrace that has been meticulously renovated to reflect its inhabitants values of contemporary living.
On first impression, the quaint facade has been sensitively restored to emphasise the proud detail that once went into building what was originally a workers cottage. Across its threshold, the home’s enfilade of rooms falling to the side of a hallway that leads from front door to living and kitchen at the rear has been retained yet the treatment of those rooms has been elevated by Studio Amble to harmoniously mediate between then and now.
A dovetailing of new and old has informed the timeless refurbishment of two front bed-rooms. Exposed masonry, refinished wide-plank timber floors and classical joinery imbue an elegant modernity while a moss green palette is the first marker of an intentional fusion between interior and landscape design principles.
An understory of light and shade in the ground-floor bedrooms is juxtaposed by the sun-drenched airiness of the living and kitchen zone which directly activates the garden be-yond. A minimal design approach brings sophisticated resolve with a fully integrated kitchen at one end, a wall of operable glazing at the other and the clean, engineered pre-cision of a stairway along the length of the space. Highlighting again the common ground between interior and landscape are a curation of robust materials often used externally – green quartzite, timber and a bluestone boulder which serves to anchor the stairway.
Juxtaposing the quietude and sedate ambiance of the entryway and downstairs bedrooms, Brunswick East opens to a light-filled kitchen and living space that leverages intelligent design to instil an atmosphere of loftiness. Despite its relatively small footprint, the volume, arrangement and treatment of the space gives the allusion of exhalation. High ceilings, dissolved thresholds between inside and out and a highly-resolved interior design language work harmoniously to cultivate a space that supports the rituals of modern living expanding out to a terrace to borrow space while retaining the possibility to shift gently into the realm of domesticity and retreat.
A new first floor extension containing bedroom, ensuite and study nook is distinguished by cathedral ceilings and seamless symmetry, embracing a sense of space through light, air, highly resolved joinery and floor to ceiling windows.
Brunswick House gently converses between inside and out via a design language that intuitively dissolves where one ends and the other begins while nurturing an atmosphere of cosy shelter.
In its dedication to natural materials, its activation between inside and out, and its intuitive expressions of colour and light Brunswick East Residence articulates the propensity for heritage homes to embrace modernity through deep consideration for those characteristics that will continue to tell its story and those contemporary introductions that will carry it and its inhabitants well into the future.
Charlotte of Studio Amble and Jayden of Greener Visions.
Architecture + Design | Studio Amble
Photography | Lillie Thompson
Build | Ben Thomas Builders
Landscaping | Greener Visions
Words | Tiffany Jade
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