This project restores clarity to a gracious heritage home that had been compromised by earlier mock-heritage interventions which obscured the original form and disrupted its connection to the garden.

Work began with a careful restoration of the front portion of the house, including the reinstatement of a wraparound verandah with decorative cast-iron lacework. Inside, the existing formal rooms were preserved and refurbished in a traditional style by Maree Howley, maintaining their character and sense of scale.

To the rear, the compromised fabric was stripped back and replaced with a crisp, contemporary intervention. The new work is expressed in a deliberately contrasting architectural language: thin plate steel, full-height glazing, and contrasting brickwork form a clear counterpoint to the ornate textures of the original house. The new volume reads as a clean slice into the existing, composed as distinct zones of old and new. Its language is precise but restrained – designed to sit respectfully alongside the historic fabric while unmistakably signalling its own time. The addition also acts as a transitional zone: a contemporary verandah-like space that frames views of the yard, extends into the garden, and softens the threshold between house and landscape.

Then & Now House invites a rethinking of heritage living – where the old is celebrated, the new is unapologetically of its time, and the threshold between house and garden becomes a place of transition and connection.