Island Building Design Challenges

By Author: Sharyn Parker
Total Articles: 39
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The lure of secluded island living in a private paradise will present design challenges during the building process that need sustainable solutions.

Some of the design considerations that need to be taken into account before building a house on an island include site location, a lack of utilities and development restrictions surrounding the local vegetation and climate.

This is something that Cameron Neil from Melbourne based firm, Neil Architecture, found out the hard way as he set out to renovate an old fishing shack as the perfect getaway for his family.

The fishing shack he renovated was actually in a flood and bushfire prone area, in a remote location that can only be accessed by boat.

To complicate the design process further, there were also protection restrictions set by the local council for the natural bushland surrounding the house.

It was only through careful design planning with the team at Neil Architecture that the existing fishing shack was re-modelled into a self-sustaining, eco-friendly holiday home.

“I think being in the industry and being able to determine the complexities ...
... of town and building requirements gave us the confidence to broker an outcome that was going to have a successful result,” Neil explained.

“A non architect buying a site like that would be too scared to buy it; in case you couldn’t do what you wanted.”

Neil told Light Home that he snapped up the old shack at a discounted price as it had already been on the market for five years.

“Everyone who looked at it thought it was too hard,” Neil said.

While the Neil Architecture team met with many design challenges along the way, they were able to renovate the home in just four and a half months and overcame the logistical constraints involved with the project.

“The construction rationale was definitely thinking about what could easily come over in a truck so we used lightweight materials that could be palleted from the other side, brought over and dropped off,” Neil explained.

“We had a local builder who came over on a barge and brought everything. He’s very organised in how he approaches things, which made for a pretty smooth build.”

For more information on the construction and renovation process involved, see the full Light Home Australian Style blog post on the Design challenges of island living.

Nina Carrozo is Client Service Manager with Light Home. Light Home is a website and bi-annual magazine that celebrates lightweight construction and light homes, because when they’re well designed, they’re perfectly suited to the way we love to live.