Heckers Hill Residence

Kangaroo Ground

This is a house composed of inter-related ellipses informed by and following the natural topographical contours of a twenty acre sheep grazing property.

The site commands one of the highest points in this outer Melbourne, semi-rural region, the property captures the distant city silhouette beyond rolling hills and native bushland.

Curvilineal walls reach out into the landscape, capturing external space and drawing the visitor from the winding entry driveway into a protected entry forecourt. This is framed by garage wing, pergola and subtly rising roofline that follows a curvaceous alignment to the house.

In the arrangement of the two intersecting segments, the larger more elongated wing houses the family sitting, kitchen and dining spaces. It rises and extends through to the children’s area, which rests along the upper slope of the block.

The shorter wing, slightly down slope of the main segment, contains the parents retreat and master bedroom, a library/living room with centre-piece stone chimney, anchoring the building into the landscape.
At their junction, the wings embrace to define a protected formal lawned garden overlooking an infinity edged pool on the lower plateau and beyond, distant blue ranges.

The house fully exhausts the opportunities to integrating the built form and landscape together in such a way as to encourage the surrounding agricultural activity, grazing sheep and roaming kangaroos, to come to the very edge of the protected residential space.