Address
:
2 Hodgson St Kew
Awards
:1954 Architecture
and Arts Award, 1955 RVIA [later RAIA] award for outstanding
architecture
Comments
:
The house was built on the site McIntyre had bought when he was
still a student. Known as butterfly house or McIntyre's house,
but now he is utilizing the building for his office. The balcony
was then transformed into an addition of the internal space.
The idea
is a giant triangle which acted as structural and spatial delineator.
The house was suspended above a 14 feet square concrete base
at the flood level mark. Between two triangular steel frames
with 40-foot cantilevers to either side and with two floors within.
Steel frame was exposed internally and externally. The exposed
structure illustrated the interest in suspension of that time
and was one of the exciting variant on the Wachsman space frame
idea. The dominant use of the triangle was a logical expression
of the lightness and tensile qualities of this structure. Overall
it explored the concept of lightness material of the fifties.
A system
of metal louvres was designed for the numerous skylight over
the studio and the living space of the house.
In its colours
and form it is and excitement of the moment. Again there is a
definition of shape and the squeezing of spaces within. The failure
to consider a growing family, the changing of the original colours,
the replacement of the panels and the filling in of the balconies
represents today the folly of much ideas yet its justification
does not fail on this point.
The interior
of the house was a rigidly composed with white steelworks. White
and black color used to differentiate between cupboard frames
and their door and drawer elements. Service pipes were located
within the main steel frames, so they are both concealed from
the view and accessible for maintenance.
References
: "Peter and Dione
McIntyre's Own House at Kew, Victoria", Architecture and
Arts June 1956; "Architect's Own House at Kew, Melbourne",
Architecture in Australia January/March 1957,p. 26-28
RAIA Gold
Medal 1990, Architecture Australia 6/90
Goad, Philip,
The Early Work of Peter McIntyre, October 1983
