Memorial Avenue

Ilam

Christchurch

THE PROJECT

Memorial Ave project is an overhaul of a dwelling which had been upgraded but with internal spatial planning to created many hallways, odd long shaped rooms and as a result a lot of wasted space. The previous upgrades to the house were of good quality, however the internal configuration would always limit the function and saleability in the future.

THE CHALLENGE

The client desired no external extensions but a consolidation of space, creating a large combined kitchen, living and dining and better functioning bathrooms and laundry. The kitchen and living areas were separated at either ends of the dwelling, which did not suit the family. The master bedroom had a space for a future ensuite, however installing this would render the main bathroom redundant. The adjacent uses and public and private areas were mixed and confused. The roof space was also under utilised and could be renovated to provide additional storage and overflow hobby spaces.

THE DESIGN

The major change in the design was to swap the location of the kitchen and the master bedroom areas. This serves two functions; placing the master bedroom into a more private area of the house with direct access to the garden. The master had a direct access en-suite and larger walk in robe. The kitchen was combined with the dining and living space with a much larger kitchen and island bench. The laundry space was changed from a cupboard to a full room with storage and new back door. The bathrooms were upgraded with new layouts and the main bathroom separated out the WC to function as a guest WC.  The roof was redesigned to add in new beams which would increase the openness of the space below as well as providing support to the existing roof framing. The old roof framing was adjusted to create more uncluttered space upstairs.

THE OUTCOMES

The design adjusted some critical errors in the floor plan which made the flow between spaces challenging. Removing the hallways and spaces between spaces provided more functional space to the interior of the dwelling. Removing the odd shaped spaces and challenging flow made the dwelling spaces feel more coherent. The kitchen and living spaces are combined with a large new kitchen. The master suite is seperated and more private from the rest of the house. With some internal configuration and structure the dwelling was reconfigured to create large sunny spaces with clear and simple flows between different areas of the dwelling.