To Coexist Without Integrating: The Bluff House by Rob Kennon Architects

The result is a building whose form appears to float above the ground, barely resting upon its surface. This appearance conceals the reality of a home that is literally embedded within the site, the design juxtaposing an enclosed, subterranean volume with a cantilevered main building pavilion. The basement, whose upper third above ground admits light and ventilation, houses the children’s bedrooms and a playroom, while two master bedrooms and living space are situated above ground.

The project sits as an object within its wider context, coexisting without integrating.

“It was important to have these very contrasting types of spaces,” explains Rob Kennon. “You have got the vastness of the main living and bedroom spaces, and then this quiet retreat below ground that is climatically neutral, and acoustically and aesthetically quiet, that lends itself to a different programme.” In this way, the design engages with very different kinds of space and forms of shelter that frame the experience of both the landscape and the home for its inhabitants.

While the main pavilion offers panoramic views to the ocean and vegetation beyond, it nevertheless deliberately mediates the experience. The impact of the horizontal floor and ceiling planes creates a consistent datum that correlates to the vast horizon, at once amplifying yet precisely delineating the context. “There is no doubt when looking outward that you are viewing from an abstract platform; it’s undoubtedly foreign,” Rob reflects.

“It was important to have these very contrasting types of spaces.”

This is consistent with the architects’ and clients’ shared belief that the building should not seek to dominate the landscape. “We wanted to create a sense of separation to a degree, primarily because neither we nor the client wanted it to be an overpowering building in the landscape,” says Rob. Thus, the home’s studied sense of separation is a means of amplifying the context, finding balance through the tension between detachment and connection.

These ‘subtracted’ spaces, in conjunction with moveable dark-stained spotted gum batten screens, cause the building to visually recede. Reflective glass to the southern elevation serves a similar purpose, though by dramatically contrasting means. The timber-clad sides and elevations where balconies have been carved out create an aporia within the structure that causes the eye to glide softly through and across. In contrast, the expanses of glazing reflect the landscape and sky back outwards. Even as the glass is mirroring the landscape, the industrial nature of the material marks it as other.

“Negatives as opposed to positives – rather than adding, we’ve subtracted something, carving these spaces out from the form.”

Stepping inside, the material palette is inverted. Here the expanses of glazing send the eye outwards, while timber-clad walls enclose and protect. Meanwhile, the external moveable batten screens create permeable walls that give the inhabitants greater control over the internal environment. Open, the full impact of the view is felt. Closed, they shelter the space against the harsh western sun and create a dappled light that changes throughout the day. As with the external form, the interior is marked by its clarity and simplicity, yet enlivened by the graphic stripes of light and shade, and the depth and texture of both sedimentary stone flooring and timber.

By embracing the tension inherent in creating a detached form within the landscape in order to create a more genuine connection, The Bluff House achieves a remarkably distilled clarity of design. This tension is a continuous thread throughout the project, informing the juxtaposition of materials, the balance between exposure and protection, and the incongruence of a suspended platform that is in fact submerged within the site. The result is a building content to coexist with the landscape, not dominating in its presence, yet compelling in its otherness.