A courtyard house set on a large coastal site on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula has been named Australian House of the Year in the 2023 Houses Awards.
Merricks Farmhouse by Michael Lumby with Nielsen Jenkins, which is also a joint winner in the New House Over 200 Square Metres category, is praised by the jury for its “consummate interlacing of house and landscape, which instils calm and equilibrium inthe home.”
“A decisive form and robust materiality are elevated by precise detailing and meticulous execution, achieving a building that is at once an ambitious and accomplished architectural project, and a warm and welcoming home,” the jury citation reads.
The other winner in the New House Over 200 Square Metres category is Shiplap House by Chenchow Little Architects, an unusual design for a battle-axe block on an exposed headland in Sydney.
Winning the New House Under 200 Square Metres category was Blok Stafford Heights by Blok Modular with Vokes and Peters, an “unpretentious, dignified and generous” Brisbane home that demonstrates the possibilities of prefabricated construction.
Also among the winners were an adaptation of a narrow Fitzroy cottage, a composed transformation of a grand Victorian-era house and a reworking of a 1970s apartment in Melbourne’s infamous downtown “tower of power.”
“The winners demonstrate the skill and ingenuity that architects and designers can bring to residential projects of all scales and budgets,” said Houses Awards jury chair and editor of Houses magazine Alexa Kempton.
“The jury recognised the designers’ ability to craft homes of exceptional quality, that push back against convention. We also saw a commitment made by design teams and their clients to creating homes resourcefully and with restraint, signalling the sustainable message of doing more with less.”
The winners are:
Australian House of the Year
Merricks Farmhouse – Michael Lumby with Nielsen Jenkins
New House over 200 m2 (joint winners)
Merricks Farmhouse – Michael Lumby with Nielsen Jenkins
Shiplap House – Chenchow Little Architects
New House under 200 m2
Blok Stafford Heights – Blok Modular with Vokes and Peters
House Alteration and Addition over 200 m2
Armadale House – Neeson Murcutt Neille
House Alteration and Addition under 200 m2
Sunday – Architecture Architecture
Apartment or Unit
Spring Street – March Studio
Garden or Landscape
Coogee Courtyard – Saha
House in a Heritage Context
Millers Point Townhouse – Design 5 Architects
Sustainability
Monty Sibbel – Nuud Studio
Emerging Architecture Practice
Commendations
See the twenty-seven commended projects.
The 2023 jury included Melissa Bright, Studio Bright; Sioux Clark, Multiplicity; Kieron Gait, Kieron Gait Architects; Anthony Gill, Anthony Gill Architects; Simone Bliss, SBLA Studio (gardens and landscape advisor); Helen Lardner, HLCD (heritage advisor); Clare Parry, Development Victoria (sustainability advisor); and Alexa Kempton, Houses magazine (jury chair).
The winners of the 2023 Houses Awards were announced at the Art Gallery of New South Wales on Friday 28 July., with projects awarded across ten categories. Each category offered a $1,000 cash prize, while the architects of the Australian House of the Year received a $5,000 cash prize.
Houses Awards is organized by Architecture Media and supported by Cult, Artedomus, the Australian Institute of Horticulture, Blum, Brickworks, the Heritage Council of Victoria, James Hardie, Sussex, Taubmans, and Latitude.
