The Swan Street Residence by Iredale Pedersen Hook Architects

Designed by Iredale Pedersen Hook Architects, The Swan Street Residence sits at the end of a mature tree lined street opposite a private girls school at Swan Street, Perth, Australia. The narrowing of the street and the no-through road resulted in an initial desire to create a project that was concerned with notions of discovery and retreat.

The wooded street and a previous completed project on the edge of the city of Perth provided an opportunity to connect with the contextual physical quality of ‘landscape’ and a sub-conscious connection to living on the edge of a city, the desire to be physically connected while offering qualities that exist in outer suburban areas, areas of natural landscape.

Green light and folding light filled spaces dominate the interior while externally the concern is the formal connections to the existing house and the surrounding context while exploiting subtle and exaggerated differences. It considers multiple moments of time- past time, immediate time, daily time, seasonal time and long-term time. This is partly achieved by a materiality that actively encourages the visibility of time.

Movement

The additions fold and unfold, compress and release to create subtle internal relationships whilst capturing and configuring the exterior space. It maintains a dynamic equilibrium that responds to the activities of everyday living carefully connecting interior and exterior in a mutually beneficial manner. Space is held in the delicate balance of reality and abstraction.