A Curvaceous Revamp Fills a Dark Sydney Terrace House With Light and Harbor Views
Stafford Architecture sculpts the interior of a Darling Point home to provide soaring ceilings and views of Rushcutters Bay.
Stafford Architecture sculpts the interior of a Darling Point home to provide soaring ceilings and views of Rushcutters Bay.
When an empty-nester couple bought a terrace house in Darling Point, a harborside suburb in Sydney, they wanted to transform it into a contemporary, light-filled home—and take advantage of the spectacular views to Rushcutters Bay. "Our brief was to create a more functional and open plan for the home," reveals Bronwyn Litera, architect at Stafford Architecture. "The biggest driver, though, was to bring in more light as the existing house was full of dark, pokey rooms and buried into the hill."
The exterior of the home features warm blackbutt timber cladding and crisp black metalwork. Each level of the home opens out to a deck or balcony, and the curved white balustrade outside the main bedroom is a contemporary take on the original architecture.
Anson Smart
The home had already gone through several changes from its original state—it had been converted into a duplex with the main stair removed, and an insensitive, square garage had been installed at the front. An additional challenge was the narrow site, which is just 24.6 feet wide. As a result, the street frontage is deceptively modest, with just the pitched roof of the garage and a simple gate visible. From this, however, the home dramatically drops away at the rear, with four levels spaced over a total height of five stories.
The site in Darling Point is on a winding street leading up a hill, and the new architecture is designed to express the pitched-roof language of the original terrace house. "It’s incredibly steep at the back, which means the house looks rather modest from the street front—just a pitched-roof garage and a gate," says architect Bronwyn Litera. "At the rear facing Rushcutters Bay, however, it drops away over a height of five stories. The house is also in a heritage conservation zone, which meant that the existing roof line and chimneys needed to be retained. We worked closely with TC Build to form a ‘plan of attack,’ which involved propping the two long walls and the roof, and completely gutting the interiors."
Anson Smart
The full experience of the home begins the moment you walk through the street-level gate and down the stairs to the entry courtyard. "You enter the front door, and suddenly experience the openness and drama, the incredible views and gorgeous rooms, all of which is entirely unexpected from the modest entry," says Litera.
The entry off the garage has views through the home to a three-story-high window to the west that looks onto trees and the bay beyond.
Anson Smart
See the full story on Dwell.com: A Curvaceous Revamp Fills a Dark Sydney Terrace House With Light and Harbor Views
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