Troppo Architects’ steel signature is all over one of the firm’s most recent successes – a tiny Victorian cottage in Adelaide, South Australia. Ripe for reinvention, the house has been given a grand sculptural lift as well as making a supreme connection with climate and site.

 

Words and imagery: Peter Hyatt

 

The North Adelaide Terrace is further example of the ‘embrace of place’ philosophy that drives Troppo Architects (one of our 2006 competition finalists). Lightly pinned to the rear of a classic, single-fronted Victorian dwelling, the practice has realised an exceptional level of craft to celebrate the old and new.

 

On the parkland fringe of North Adelaide, the house is a tale with a truly surprising ending. From the street elevation, there is little to indicate the modern transplant hinged off its rear. Discrete triangulations that flare from the roofline hint at the cleverness that extends behind the house.

 

“On such a small site it is usual to want to stretch everything to its limit. But,” qualifies Troppo founding partner Phil Harris, “not to the point where things fail in terms of regulations, budget, or a design that goes haywire.”

 

 

Troppo was vigorously and vocally sustainable long before most of the world caught on. The firm’s residential work was so stripped back and spare that it polarised opinion. Founding partners Phil Harris and Adrian Welke – who hailed from Adelaide and Perth respectively, but established the firm together in Darwin – immediately generated attention for their desire to remove walls and dissolve boundaries, rather than create them. “Darwin is the easiest climate in the world to design for,” Harris recalls. “Adelaide has more shades and seasons. In Darwin you barely need a house. You need a big wide hat to keep the sun off and its vegetation grows so quickly that it can provide another layer of shelter to mediate the climate. We were trying to work ourselves out of buildings in many ways by continually stripping out structure and cladding.”

 

Fast-forward 30 years and this spirit of lightweight, climatically appropriate constructions reveals the same informed passion that defined the practice from its earliest days. Harris returned to Adelaide in 1999, and the practice now has offices throughout Australia. In these times of heightened environmental awareness, their work doesn’t simply adhere to fashionable community-mindedness, it’s still rooted in their full immersion in place.

 

The extension faces due north and incorporates a fine steel structure that enables maximum winter light penetration, yet acts as an effective solar shield. Broad midday and afternoon shade is provided by the angular LYSAGHT CUSTOM ORB® profile projection that scoops morning light into the house. The light surface colour of the lap pool also acts as a soft reflector to bounce light into the galvanised, rippled steel soffit and back into the body of the house.

 

The design provides well-lit, open flowing space throughout two levels, elegantly contrasting with the darker, more enclosed masonry rooms of the original villa. The master bedroom with ensuite occupies the mezzanine level. It provides elevated views across the city perimeter parklands and neighbouring rooftops, as well as to the northern backyard. A retained chimney is integrated as a focal element.

A 900mm-wide side yard on the east elevation has been judiciously incorporated to expand the floorplan by an appreciable width. A Danpalon-roofed structure provides for mezzanine access, window seat, laundry and a downstairs bathroom. A sheer frosted glass screen is inserted in the Victorian entrance hall to disguise and access the bathroom.

 

A lap pool at window-seat level concludes the entrance hall axis. On this same axis, a small glass floor views and accesses the original brick cellar. Remodelling of the small backyard delivers a balance of deck, lawn and paved spaces that connects to a broadly opening lightweight framed carport. Rainwater storage is provided under the rear deck using natural site levels.

 

 

The small dimensions of the site, combined with the need to open up and engage with the diminutive external areas, posed serious design challenges, as did Harris’ desire to retain structural elements that required new supports when their myriad little walls were removed in line with his underlying ethos. The resulting space has a quality that transcends pragmatics, however, and boasts a distinctive and appealing interplay between old and new.

 

“The Council is strong on heritage,” observes Harris, “and revealing the old and the new is fully supported by it, so there was a willingness by the client to be brave.”

 

Mostly pre-fabricated off-site, the larger steel sections were craned in without any difficulty. “Steel was critical to the result,” says Harris. “It provided the slender support for the old structure. Because of the tight site, a more complex grid system was required than would normally be the case. We needed to make every square millimeter work and this meant some parts of the new needed to be off-set. If we tried it in timber and tiles, for instance, there would have been many more joints and junctions which would have made for an incredibly messy result.

 

Invariably working with lightweight materials – notably cladding in LYSAGHT CUSTOM ORB® profile made from COLORBOND® steel – the practice has defined an archetypal tropical style that has influenced practitioners, clients and regulators around Australia.

 

www.SteelProfile.com.au

 

Project Summary

Architect:	Troppo Architects (SA) – Phil Harris, Carly Williams, Tain Patterson
Interior Design:	Enoki
Structural Engineer:	Combe Patterson Reynolds
Builder:	Paul Gardiner
Steel Fabricator:	Lincoln Engineers
Steel Roofing Contractor:	Old Port Roofing
Principal Steel Components:	LYSAGHT CUSTOM ORB® profile made from galvanised steel
Building Size:	86m2
Total Project Cost:	$460,000 (includes $47,000 for pool)