A tri-gabled addition helps to reorient this home towards the sun and the view, creating a light and bright living area that completely transforms the everyday lives of the owners.

The owners of this Preston house explored the idea of moving to a more suitable home, but ultimately realised that creating their ideal home right where they are made more sense both financially and for their lifestyle. The original home, a 1950s-era weatherboard, had generous-sized rooms, but felt dated and dysfunctional. A lean-to out the back containing a bedroom and a sunroom/laundry meant the living areas felt cramped, dark and disconnected from the backyard.

The renovation keeps much of the original home intact to save on costs and utilise the original home’s pros, but includes upgraded insulation and fabulous new double-glazed windows to create a thermally-efficient and comfortable home.

A new addition perches on the hill, opening up to garden and grass to the north, while a picture window frames uninterrupted views of the rooftops and treetops of the nearby Merri Creek and Coburg Lakes Reserve.

The tri-gabled addition crowns the new living, dining and kitchen. Each space enjoys its own cathedral ceiling to create a unique and generous sense of space and volume. A bank of north-facing windows and doors open onto the deck, which in turn spills into the garden to create the ideal indoor-outdoor space. The three gables serves another purpose, helping the addition to match the scale and proportions of the original home and its neighbours.

By turning the former lounge into a new main bedroom suite and reworking what was the kitchen into a new bedroom, the home has transformed from a disjointed and cramped three-bedroom, one-bathroom house, into a spacious four-bedroom, two-bathroom home. 

This new home is a warm and inviting private oasis, a place where you can breathe out and relax. The new addition respects the old and seamlessly connects to vistas and landscapes. It reflects its family, and supports their best life now and into the future, all while preserving the planet.