Some houses announce themselves. Others answer to the land they sit on. Hoddles Creek House, a modern farmhouse set across 43 acres in Victoria's Yarra Valley, does the latter. Recently featured on Hunting for George, it was designed by Mitsuori Architects and built by ACS Builders, for a family who left the city to return to the place that shaped them.
Rather than sitting the house on top of the hill, the architects nestled it into the slope. It reveals itself slowly as you approach. The folded roofline takes its cues from the surrounding hills, an undulating form that continues inside through angled timber ceilings. Blackbutt cladding wraps the exterior and has already begun to weather to a soft grey, helping the building settle among the gum trees rather than stand apart from them.
Inside, the palette stays deliberately narrow. A central concrete fireplace anchors the main living space without closing it off. An oversized concrete island bench does the same for the kitchen, scaled for a family who actually cook. In the main bathroom, travertine pool tiles run all the way to the ceiling, paired with an oversized bath made from a repurposed cow trough the homeowners hand-sanded themselves, a considered use of a utilitarian object, practical first and sculptural as a result. Timber, concrete, glass and steel form the foundation. Every material is left to age rather than resist it.
