INNOVATION 31
to let in the light and views to the north. Otherwise, it’s clad in low-maintenance fibre cement sheeting and profiled Chromadek sheeting traditionally used for roofing. “As a holiday house, it had to be low- maintenance,” says Nel. Design-wise, he says, “it had to be more relaxed than a permanent residence”. To facilitate the casual outdoors lifestyle for which the area’s known – mountain-biking, boating, canoeing, long walks on the beach and generally kicking back and relaxing in the open air – he included interior-exterior areas. “The main bedroom has sliding doors that you open to step straight onto the lawn,” he says. “And we added a big veranda, deck and gabion wall at the front to extend the living area and maximise on its outdoor spaces. The gabion wall earths it and provides context.” It also provides privacy, so passers-by can’t peer in, while helping to frame the view and obscure neighbouring houses. “If you stand in the house, you can see over the gabions,” says Nel, “but from the street you can’t see into the house.” Interestingly, the decision to use standard- height rather than floor-to-ceiling sliding doors and then add windows above turned out to have extra benefits. “If you want privacy, you can close the blinds and still let in natural light at the top,” says Nel.
3
it’s only beginning to gain traction as a popular method of building homes. But it’s perfect for remote places like Fisherhaven because most of the components are manufactured off-site in a factory and delivered to the site ready to assemble in a few weeks, like Meccano. The construction process is quick, precise and clean, and has much less impact on the environment than conventional building methods. Nel’s also developed a precast concrete foundation system that’s manufactured off-site, which guarantees the strength of the home’s base. Between the lightness of the structure (about 10% of the weight of bricks and mortar) and these foundations, this prefab construction method is particularly well suited to tricky conditions – where soil quality’s poor, for example. It also means it’s possible to push the envelope
design-wise, without blowing the budget. “Most of the places we do are custom-designed,” says Nel. “It’s very rare that I use standardised units.” He designed this 90m2
, two-bedroomed, one-
bathroomed cottage for clients as a weekend retreat. Since completing it, he’s been invited to holiday there himself, so he’s had the opportunity to enjoy its benefits. In many ways, Nel’s design took its inspiration
from Scandinavian summer homes, known for their simplicity and lack of pretentions, but also for their warmth and stripped-down comfort. And it has all of this without being afraid of modernity. The main section of the house is a sleek, modern box with large, double-glazed doors and windows
4
The back of the house is relatively impenetrable. “It has small, high-level windows, so there are no significant openings from that side,” he explains. “That’s partly for privacy, but also because of the
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