Architect Matt Ross Goodman loves the city of Separation Creek (positioned alongside the Nice Ocean Street, about 150 kilometres south-west of Melbourne) so when the world was devastated by bushfires in 2015, he pitched in to assist.
Providing his architectural companies to everlasting residents who misplaced their houses, Matt accomplished three professional bono tasks, which in flip knowledgeable foundations of his then fledgling follow Matt Ross Goodman Structure Workplace.
He explains, ‘We learnt a lot over the 4 to 5 years engaged on these tasks — all invaluable classes for my profession. All the tasks had been on tough steep websites, with excessive BAL scores, and landslip dangers.
‘These three tasks — initiated by means of our want to assist — enabled me to develop my strategy to design, while inadvertently creating my data and expertise in quite a few advanced areas that I could have by no means been uncovered to had I not leant a hand.’
On the similar time Matt was working within the space, he found a dream plot of vacant land for a vacation home to swimsuit his rising household.
Matt designed the brand new home on a comparatively small 91-square-metre footprint to minimise each its visible impression and constructing prices.
‘We needed the undertaking to take a seat comfortably inside the surrounds and never visually dominate it like among the newer bigger houses,’ he says.
‘Our web site is surrounded by some unique fibro seashore shacks which have a humble scale and easy use of supplies, and we needed to be a pleasant new neighbour to those outdated houses…
‘The oblong footprint was essentially the most value efficient strategy.’
The place the design breaks away from the world’s unique shacks is thru intensive use of glazing on the entrance facade, and what Matt describes because the comparatively fussy detailing to hide the window frames from view.
‘There have been many causes for this, the principle being that we actually needed to be as shut and linked as potential to the expansive view,’ he says.
Externally, the home is clad in Colorbond Customized Orb sheets, largely within the color Windspray, to match to the basalt and riverstones that line close by Separation Creek seashore.
Sliding screens shut down the rear of the home when not in use, creating an arrival ritual that builds anticipation of the magical view revealed upon every go to.
The rest of the fabric palette is likewise value environment friendly, comprising fibre cement sheet, plasterboard and laminate joinery. Blackbutt timber on the flooring and have joinery softens what would possibly in any other case be a comparatively exhausting set of supplies.
The home was constructed by Basebuild Constructions for $457,000, though Matt says that determine doesn’t account for a lot of favours, and the rising value of development post-COVID lockdowns.
‘Based mostly on various present tasks which now we have within the space, I imagine the price of our construct could be double at greatest, seemingly between $800,000 and $900,000,’ he says.
‘This is because of quite a few elements, but the important thing issue being shortage/availability of builders and trades who service the world, and the tough working situations which the city poses.’
Matt’s house is one among 14 he’s designed to date within the Separation Creek space following the 2015 bushfires. Now a part-time resident, his love of the city is stronger than ever.
‘It’s really essentially the most superb place on the Victorian shoreline.’












