While life is indeed good when you live on the edge of the Great Western Tiers in northern Tasmania, there is always room for improvement! Our client wanted to spend more time on his bush block. However, Rodney’s existing small weatherboard shack (28m2), which he had relocated onto the site some years ago, lacked basic amenities and was raised three metres above ground level. Rodney asked us to design a ‘new’ home for him reusing this existing structure, to be located more sensitively on site with respect to the surrounding wet eucalyptus forest. We have designed a new kitchen, living room and bathroom flowing on from the existing shack where the space has been modified to provide two bedrooms. The new dwelling will only occupy 76m2 in total, a much smaller footprint in comparison to the average floor area of dwellings located across Australian capital cities, which according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics is ~248m2 as of 2019-20. Rodney will be able to take in the forest views from his sun-bathed window nook or verandah, where he can also receive guests more comfortably much closer to the ground!

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Australian Bureau of Statistics: https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/australians-building-houses-smaller-blocks