The Rock; Single-storey Neo-colonial Australian Sandstone Farmhouse
By SDA Architects
'The Rock', is the dream sandstone semi-rural home of a retiring Stonemason, who always wanted to build his own stone house. The early initial concept design was hand-sketched and drafted by Architect, Anthony Battah. For Development Application (DA) purposes, the project was taken over by SDA Architects in order to completely resolve the design and see it through; the final design development stage, construction certificate stage, and lastly, occupation certificate stage, marking project completion. SDA Architects submitted a Section 96 for major changes whilst maintaining the original Neo Colonial desired style.
The single-storey residential plan consists of a courtyard-style design with a colonial-esque style west elevation, juxtaposing the heavy materiality of stone with light-filled airy internal spaces that are flooded with natural light. Construction of the external Sandstone walls was built by the owner and his team at Gosford Quarries gradually over three years under the supervision of SDA Architects. The Australian Hawksbury Sandstone is distinctive to the Sydney Metropolitan and Central Coast regions in New South Wales.
The defining features of 'The Rock' farmhouse are bespoke to this particular project, in which careful consideration was taken to the design development of the detail profiles applied to the architectural features including; the window heads, lintels, external architraves and corbel throughout the residence. The result is a unique combination of a traditional masonry material being realised using contemporary Computer Numeric Cutting (CNC) machinery to achieve a nexus between historic Australian early settlement building fabric and modern-day applications.
The marriage of Australian natural materials; Hawksbury Sandstone and hardwood timber compliment the property’s semi-rural acreage site and nurtures a warm and welcoming family home.
Photography by Ben Williams.
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The Rock; Single-storey Neo-colonial Australian Sandstone Farmhouse
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An award-winning practice based in Dural, designing works of crafted harmony & timeless beauty - from coast to city to country.
Quite often it feels like reading an architects’ website statement adds to the confusion and overwhelm already surrounding the daunting conversations people have when considering taking on a project. They all say the same thing: we’re design-focused, offer bespoke solutions, award-winning, enrich the quality of peoples lives, etc…a polished and somewhat cold academic approach to quote-unquote professionalism to console the worries of someone considering hiring you.
We’d like to tell you SDA has a specific anniversary date of when we started. Often we say 2015, sometimes 2017, but we were floating from home offices to small rentals in industrial complexes and our name was #!@?, which we quickly learnt was too complicated to use because 1. It was impossible to pronounce over the phone and 2. You couldn’t get a website. In 2018, we were registered and had assigned our first nominated architect, but by then we had already worked on projects; both old and new, and had taken on small renovations, larger new builds, and heritage restoration. We eventually landed on SDA – an acronym for Sarkis Design Associates; who we are, what we do and who we work with – a reflection of a shared desire to connect people to place.
We started on a narrow-long table working alongside each other, a creative space for design experimentation, problem-solving, exploration, coffee and questionable music playlists. We are now located in Dural, we have grown a little, but remain alongside each other in an open-plan office, working together on each project through playful testing and serious research. We have won some awards. We have written some articles. We have entered Design Competitions. We have built some buildings. We are currently making more. This website files that work: residential homes, galleries, churches, installations, writing, sketches, prototypes, software experiments and videos. We like working with people who enjoy collaborating and value good design. All our designs are energy-efficient and environmentally considerate, because other than costing you less to run and maintain, an energy-efficient home is a comfortable home.
- Year founded2017
- ArchiPro Member since2021
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