Deepdene House

Kennedy Nolan was commisoned to design a new house to comfortably accommodate a family of seven in a highly sustainable building. The house was carefully designed to respond to the Edwardian character of its suburban street that the neighbours and owners highly valued. Our investigations revealed that a salient characteristic of the Edwardian garden suburb was roofs and chimneys emerging from lush tree canopies.

In finding a workable model we looked to the Arts and Crafts movement and its proto-modernist philosophies as a way to satisfy our brief requirements and our own compulsion to modernity.

There is whimsy, joy and beauty in this house: the formally expressive chimneys with their hand made pots, the fragrant cedar lined pyramid of the main living area, the heft and shadow of the brick and concrete rear pavilion, the intense colour and texture of the interior surfaces – all contribute to a house which is so much more than the sum of its parts.