The House with Old Roots is a Highly Liveable Family Home

The House with Old Roots is a highly liveable, functional and cost-effective family home which also achieves high levels of energy efficiency through passive solar design. The home includes a series of playful design elements which also skilfully perform dual roles in creating a sustainable building. The central double-height void (with sunken lounge and a suspended fireplace), is framed by exposed brick internal walls which add thermal mass to the building. The butterfly roof is set at the perfect angle to maximise solar access, with the uplifted rear wing aligned for the solar PV array.

Other key sustainability elements include the northern orientation, triple glazed and thermally broken windows, 100% electric, high levels of insulation and importantly an overall compact footprint. This allows plenty of room in the garden for deciduous plantings for natural solar input control.  All these measures help the building to achieve very low levels of total energy consumption.

The House with Old Roots will minimise the carbon emissions of the occupants and is highly future proofed to handle increasing temperatures due to climate change. This building effectively demonstrates that sustainable architecture does not need to be costly, and that it can be beautifully integrated into a comfortable and engaging family home.