Garden Hill House

We enjoyed receiving an excellent brief from our clients, a couple with one child, for the design of their new home that included this wonderful information about the history of the site. The intention on the property was to commercially grow and harvest truffles with the house intended to reflect the properties history of vegetable produce.

We together found the right location on the site to position the new house that allowed outlook over the rising slopes beyond the valley that runs centrally through the property. In this position we could achieve good access to the northern sun with the house appearing to nestle into the surrounding natural bush land.

In 1829 Ensign Robert Dale was the first European ever to enter the area around what is now known as Paulls Valley. Dale encountered Beeloo people of the Noongar nations along the way, whose leader at the time was said to be a young man, Munday. 

In 1886, a large area of land was leased by John Henry King who with his wife and four young children built and lived in a timber slab house on the land. They developed 10 acres of land planting fruit trees and vegetables near a creek and called it Garden Hill. King was also active in the local sawmill industry up until 1929 when they sold Garden Hill to Albert (Bert) Paull. Paull, a widower with four young daughters lived on the property growing rhubarb, daffodils and gladioli.

Notably in 1933 when a devastating bushfire threatened Garden Hill, it was a local Beeloo man, Ted Nannup who lived nearby who saved Bert Paull’s home from the bushfire.

In 1947 one of Bert Paull’s daughters purchased Garden Hill from her father and continued to work the garden while her father stilled lived on the property.

Starting in Albany and stretching 1000km to the north is the Darling Fault, one of the longest and most significant fault lines on Earth, formed when India and Australia broke apart millions of years ago. The Darling Range region is an old, complicated landscape, which in places geographically is not fully understood, where some of the oldest rocks on earth are exposed. The granite, gneisses and quartzites are more than 2,500 million years old.

What we see today as granite may have originated around 2700 million years ago as molten granite (batholith: a large body of igneous rock that crystalised at considerable depth below the earth’s surface).

An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that forms as a result of faulting or erosion and separates two relatively level areas having different elevations.

Due to the steep and rocky blocks in the area of Darlington, Boya, and Helena Valley there has been a rich variety of housing types built over the years dealing with the challenges of designing and building on such sites. 

The geology of the area with its ferricrete capping has an association with the unique existence of Jarrah/Marri Forest. South-west Australia has the only tall forest in a temperate zone with a Mediterranean climate. This is due to our wet winters but very dry summers and the resulting stress on the vegetation. Below the ferricrete layer is a clay-rich (kaolin-rich), water-retaining horizon. The kaolin has a crystal lattice that absorbs water and nutrients making it available to plants, if they can reach it. Jarrah and Marri have evolved roots that penetrate the ferricrete layer to access the clayey zone. Therefore, water availability during summer is almost guaranteed.

Fauna found in the region includes the Bobtail Lizard (Tiliqua rugosa), the Short-beaked Echidna (Tachyglossus aculeatus), Black Cockatoo, Galah, Australian Ringneck and Major Mitchell’s Cockatoo.

The Darling Scarp is home to several spectacular species of Sun Orchid, many of which are rare and endangered. Among the more common species are the beautiful Queen Orchid (Thelymitra crinita) and the Scented Sun Orchid (Thelymitra macrophylla), both of which are abundant throughout the Darling Scarp, flowering in springtime from mid-September until early November.

The house has a square plan form with split levels rising up the hill from the entry level to the living spaces and down to the bedrooms.

While providing extensive views out over the property and to the bush beyond was important, it was also important to provide some more private areas as there is an open aspect to neighbours, despite the large area of the site. Therefore, we resolved to create a central internalised outlook into the courtyard that contrasted with the outward looking open views across the property. 

External materials reflect both the history of the area and the bushfire prone site. Blackened timber forms external above the granite capstone base, chosen due to the local the laterite rock found on the site and throughout the area.

The building is capped with a terracotta shingle tile in peaked roof forms that make the house identifiable as a ‘sort of village’ of separate yet interconnected buildings. The western side of the building buries itself into the hillside with concrete roofs surrounding the central courtyard. This central courtyard also creates sanctuary form the prevailing winds.

The building is partly built into the hillside with vegetation growing above the western portion of the building, providing thermal moderation to the interior spaces.

The site and building meld together with a external stairs connecting the rear garden areas to the central courtyard and down to the pool and entertainment area.

It is the intention that the house will appear to rise up out of the hill.

The design of Garden Hill House is in part inspired by the ‘Creek Vean’ house located in Cornwall, UK, designed in 193 – 66 by T4 architects (Richard Rogers, Su Rogers, Norman Foster & Wendy Foster). Creek Vean house is positioned on a sloping site with the building mass articulated to allow the stepping landscape to rise up between the building forms, as has been proposed in the design of Garden Hill House.

This house was designed to reduce energy and water consumption over its projected long lifespan. The site orientation and the teasing apart of the floor plan provide northern orientation to living spaces and maximise opportunities for cross ventilation from prevailing southwest winds.

Importantly the main living spaces enjoy direct orientation to the north for winter solar penetration. First floor walls and roof are timber framed and highly insulated. Windows are double glazed and roof top solar PV panels provide solar power. A large underground water tank contributes to summer watering of the property.