Bordering the Kaipara Harbour, Swallow Point House is a secondary residence for an Auckland family. The building is based around the ‘family tent’ idea in camping, providing: accommodation for the couple and their three sons (from teen to adult); the ability to work from home; additional living/shared spaces (including a library/music room); and spaces for intensified use over holiday periods. The brief included immersion in the natural environment, maximising the experience of living alongside the harbour – its tidal rhythms, storms, sun, light, wind and rain.

To minimise its physical presence, and to create separation and privacy between accommodation units, the house is designed as a series of low-profile structures. This allowed the roof form to be broken down into seven individual structures and to create a ‘fifth elevation’ that is well modulated and scaled when seen from the approach road above. It also allowed distance, privacy, acoustic separation, and ‘journey’ to be created within the plan.

The entry court is adjacent the hill, with the plan arranged from SW to NE to give each key interior space a harbour view. Rooms wrap around the edge of the hill platform from the main bedroom and offices to the SW, to main living spaces on the northern corner, to the three bedroom suites stepped along the NE edge. Outdoor spaces and courtyards provide shelter according to wind direction. Spaces are detailed so they feel part of the environment, not simply a window on it.

Circulation paths between huts are treated as active space, using lower ceilings and narrow timber boards to bring down scale and codify the transition space. Accessed via these sheltered walkways, the bedrooms in each structure become very discrete. Entries are concealed to heighten the feeling of seclusion within the plan.

The location of the building platform offered proximity to the sea and intimacy with the landscape. The small promontory provided sweeping views of the harbour, but its exposed position and steep contours required significant investment in land stabilisation before building could proceed.