An addition to a grand Spanish-style villa on the headland overlooking Barrenjoey and Palm Beach, an hour’s drive north of Sydney, sought to complement the existing building with a contemporary architectural addition.

The new section of the house consists of three slabs projecting out from the existing floor levels. Between these slabs a series of boxes are placed, seemingly at random, and all poking out beyond the line of the slab to be external to the facade. The boxes contain various parts of the program, such as bedrooms, kitchen and dining room. The spaces around the boxes are the living areas of the house.

All of the boxes are externally clad in weathered timber boards, routed with a flower pattern, even when the box is contained within the outer glass facade of the house. This creates a play between inside and out. By contrast, the interior of the boxes are lined in timber veneer, a different veneer for each box, just like Claude Monet’s house in Giverny where each bedroom is painted a different color – yellow, red, blue, green.

Location: Palm Beach NSW, Australia°35’37.49″S, 151°19’22.93″E
Date: 2005
Team: Thierry Lacoste, David Stevenson, Alicia Bayl, Chloe Lanser, Sergio Corona, Emilie Lepron, Adam Grasso, Angela Rowson, Andrew Noonan, Djibraan Hossen, Louise Parsonage, Julien Feucht, Kristina Mikas, Lucie Hybnerova, Tiffany Harper, Jane Bober
Landscape architects: Anton James Design, Diana Pringle
Contractor: Coddington Constructions
Photography / images: Lacoste+Stevenson Architects