Composition House by Studio Prineas

The expansion of this two-storey 1950s home was entrusted to Studio Prineas by a client who had grown up in the house and taken over ownership from their parents. A brother and sister living nearby added to the family’s affection for – and emotional investment in – the design outcome. While the clients enjoyed the home’s comfort and familiarity, the dwelling had fallen into disrepair and needed to be refreshed with a subtle touch that would retain key features, pay homage to the original design and better suit their lifestyle.

Throughout the design process, Studio Prineas focused on renovating only where the home needed care or improvements to environmental efficiency. The major move for the alteration and addition was an extension of the upper floor plate into the north-facing backyard and a reorientation of the roof plane over this new work, rising toward the yard in a butterfly form reminiscent of homes of this era. New steel-framed casement windows – modelled off those on the front facade of the home – establish a rhythmic wall, bringing a wash of light and warmth into the living and sleeping spaces on this floor and underscoring the home’s mid-twentieth-century origins.

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Once black, the kitchen joinery is now white with black accents. Artwork: Matilda Dumas.

Image: Chris Warnes

The kitchen sits at the centre of the expanded living platform, overlooking the kidney-shaped pool. The original black-painted joinery has been flipped to white with black accents. And a sleek, steel-framed island bench features a deep terracotta-coloured cladding, a respectful nod to a harlequin shower bay artwork painted by the client’s father, which was removed with the new work. The slenderness of the new joinery and details, such as in the island bench’s fine steel legs, aligns with the overall aesthetic and helps to maintain a sense of openness in what is still a modestly scaled living space.

The bathrooms have been reinvented while retaining touches of the familiar. Gridded tiles in two tones form the walls, floor, bathing spaces and planters, with contrasting grout emphasizing the clean geometry of the design. The terracotta colour references the tiles that used to pave the downstairs rooms by the pool, another way that the designers have crafted a space that feels fresh yet makes space for lingering memories of the original home. Studio Prineas’s act of careful mending has offered these families several more generations of enjoyable, light-filled living.