Architecture

A Space-Efficient Family Home Filled With Colour (+ The Brightest Bathroom EVER)

Jane Caught of Sibling Architecture describes the firm’s latest project as a clinker. Not the slang term for jail, but the beloved retro lolly! With its pops of pastel surfaces and neon finishes, the ‘Family Framework’ house is as joyous as a chocolate-coated pellet of colourful sugar fondant; but with all the trimmings for a modern family home.

Filled with personality (and an extensive art collection!), this Preston gem contains clever tricks of colour and movement to recreate mid-century architecture with a millennial budget!

Written
by
Sasha Gattermayr

Pops of colour in the kitchen and dining area! Photo – Christine Francis.

The view into the lounge is punctuated by pops of garden greenery. Photo – Christine Francis.

Colourful lattice work is a feature inside and out! Photo – Christine Francis.

This vibrant hub is the central core of the house! Photo – Christine Francis.

Coloured geometric film on the windows reference mid-century style diagonal lines. Photo – Christine Francis.

The front rooms remain largely untouched, while the bulk of the renovation is concentrated on the back half. Photo – Christine Francis.

The bathroom is coloured like a tequila sunrise. Photo – Christine Francis.

Red grout and white tiles is inverted on the floor, with red tiles and white grout! Photo – Christine Francis.

Controlled splashes of colour continue outside! Photo – Christine Francis.

Pink external latticework casts a brilliantly joyful sherbet shadow across the back half of the house. Photo – Christine Francis.

The natural greenery flourishes around this poppingly pink family home. Photo – Christine Francis.

Writer
Sasha Gattermayr
17th of April 2020

The candy cane palette of Sibling Architecture’s latest project is more than just a lolly box filled with fizzy sherbet hues and bubblegum pink. Colour was vital to the clients Nadine Christensen and James Lynch, who are both artists, and became a central component in the design of this home.

The bathroom’s colour scheme looks almost like a tequila sunrise, the beaming orange shower screen giving way to walls lined in white tiles paved with red grout! The inverse exists on the shower floor, where crimson tiles give the washing space a warm, deep glow that echoes the neon pink steel grid latticing the exterior.

Geometric cut-outs of coloured film cling to glazing throughout the structure, mirroring the mid-century contours of Case Study houses along the West Coast of North America. Diagonal lines referencing the butterfly roofs and cranked colonnades typical of mid-century architecture are peppered throughout the house, as ‘using inexpensive, utilitarian materials is offset by a generous approach to colour and texture that complements the client’s extensive art collection,’ Jane explains. She also notes that layering the shapes on coloured doors creates the illusion of movement.

By choreographing the illusion of complicated moving partitions, the architects struck a balance between nurturing family connection and allowing for individual relief. The illusion materialises in practise in the back half of the house, where the connection between the main lounge and dining areas can be opened or closed via a flexible screen that adjusts privacy. ‘If dinner becomes all-absorbing, or the homework and wine drinking gets rowdy, activities can spill out into the outdoor living zone or into the garden beyond,’ Jane explains.

As optimising personal space was also a key priority for the clients, getting the precise balance between communal and private spaces was crucial. ‘The back section is opened up to create a more useable, flexible and communal area for the family,’ says Jane, while the segregated rooms at the front of the house are ‘an opportunity for solace’.

The word ‘unique’ gets bandied around a lot… but this is a home that truly deserves that descriptor. We’ve never seen a home quite like this before!

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