Austinmer Beach House

Located in one of the Illawara’s premier beachside suburbs and sitting on the headland of Austinmer Beach is this amazing, curved, elongated home perched on concrete columns.

The clients had only recently returned to Australia after spending time in Amsterdam and London and decided to sidestep the metropolitan area to take advantage of everything this coastal hamlet had to offer a couple starting a family. The clients wanted a design that encompassed their dream of creating a family home that would maximise the aspect onto the water and headland whilst maintaining privacy. They also wanted a Scandinavian feel, a style which they had picked up after their stints overseas. Alexander Symes Architect in association with g + V architecture as well as site builders Matt Jolley of MJB North Pty Ltd worked closely to create a stylish home that fulfilled the clients’ brief.

Both Alexander and Matt wanted to create a home that achieved the perfect mix of meeting the clients requirements and using sustainable methodologies to create an efficient, low ecological impact home. Due to the nature of the house, the design and building team were all pushed to new levels. There were many challenges throughout the duration of the project which needed to be worked through to ensure the clients’ brief was met. Challenges included the angled piers holding up the first floor, the complexity of detail in the recycled brickwork, as well as the tight nature of the site and the general shape of the building overall.

As part of the Architects and builder’s attempts to create a sustainable, thermally efficient home, a high quality glazing solution was required to ensure design features were able to be achieved with large spans of windows and doors whilst maintaining thermal efficiency. Aluminium window and door manufacturer Hanlon Windows were used on this project due to their expertise and experience in creating window and door solutions that ensured design and functionality features were met. The use of Elevate™ high performance systems in conjunction with double glazing allowed for better retention of the heat gain within the internal living areas. Abundant, full height glass bi-fold doors aid in this process, whilst adding to the feeling of connectivity between the inside and outside areas. As a requirement, all of the windows and doors installed had to achieve a low U-value in accordance with BASIX, which was difficult due to the amount of glazing required to take in the views.

Hanlon Windows assisted in the selection from the Elevate™ range of aluminium systems in combination with glass selections to provide the perfect solution and exceeded the levels required to pass and exceed the thermal efficiency section of BASIX. A selection of Elevate™ aluminium systems were used throughout including Series 400 fixed frame windows, Series 462 sliding windows, Series 411 bi-fold doors, Series 704 SlideMASTER™ doors, Series 52 door panels and the AWS pivot door system.

This project took out The Master Builders Australia Environment and Energy Efficiency Building National Housing Project Award at the National Excellence in Building and Construction Awards. Chief Executive of Master Builders Australia, Wilhelm Harnisch, said This home employs a wide range of innovations that go above the energy efficiency standards. It is an example of the building and construction industry’s commitment to raise the benchmark.