As the 2025 Houses Awards entry deadline looms, we take a glimpse inside the 2024 Australian House of the Year, Red Hill House and Studio by Zuzana and Nicholas.
The winning home, a gradually refurbished Queenslander, was designed to accommodate living spaces for a family of four, as well as a studio for its architect owners. It’s featured here in a video by Ravens at Odds, with music by Do the Robot.
In his review of the house, published in Houses 158, Dirk Yates describes the home as a “version of the shop-top house.” The old rooms of the existing cottage have been reworked and reordered in what is, he writes, “a pleasurable reimagining of the qualities of a Queenslander, without being kitsch or coy. There is an emphasis on comfort, amenity of light and airflow rather than volume … Spaces are intimate, quirky and lovely.”
Additions at the rear of the cottage and downstairs, by contrast, connect to both the garden and the neighbourhood. “Large sliding panels open across the entirety of the eastern edge and make the dining space feel verandah-like,” Yates observes. “Protected but breezy, filled with light but in shade, it offers the twin feeling of being both out in the world and supported by the amenity of an articulated room. Cleverly contrived views of the leafy neighbourhood and down to the children’s play area in the garden are glorious in their simplicity.” Downstairs, a ground-floor studio, more open to the street, “embraces the enjoyable qualities of a traditional Queenslander undercroft.
The home was named Australian House of the Year at the 2024 Houses Awards for its inventive response that “disrupts the well-trodden path of adaptations to a familiar housing type.” The jury citation declared: “In opting to stay within the existing footprint, in exploring ways that a private domestic space can engage with the neighbourhood, and in adopting a loose-fit, long-life ethos that supports the happy coexistence of work and domestic life, the architects have reframed the house without eradicating the qualities of the original. Confident yet understated and exquisitely resolved, Red Hill House and Studio is an exceptional example of the potency of doing less.”
The entry deadline for the 2025 Houses Awards is inching closer, with the final chance to submit on 14 March 2025. This year’s program comprises ten awards categories, including Australian House of the Year, New House under 200 m², New House over 200 m², House Alteration and Addition under 200 m², House Alteration and Addition over 200 m², Apartment or Unit, Sustainability, House in a Heritage Context, Emerging Architecture Practice, as well as a brand new Small Project category.
For more stories on the 2025 Houses Awards, explore the list of distinguished residential design experts selected for the jury and a collection of past Houses Awards entries compiled to celebrate the potential of the new Small Project category.
This article is republished from ArchitectureAu. Read the original article.