MARCUS BEACH HOUSE BY BARK DESIGN ARCHITECTS

An Australian house built around a tree

With the design of the Marcus Beach House, BARK Design Architects accomplished something rather curious. Throughout the numerous houses we’ve studied and talked about here, we have seen houses that were built according to the topography of the site they were built on or in accordance with the surrounding environment. The Marcus Beach House has been built around a tree!

In fact, the Australian house is a celebration of nature. If the house is centered around a 50-year-old tree, it also has layers of transparency, of volumes covered with a glass-clad and polycarbonate walls that give them a sheer sense of lightness and filters the natural breeze. Outdoor and indoor spaces are intricately connected by wooden paths leading to the numerous parts of the house and a large, covered patio.

The result is a house that conveys a great feeling of comfort inside of a structure that is sustainable, simple and well-connected to its environment. The flourishing natural surroundings of the house provide subtle shade and passive ventilation, while wood-slat screens protect the house from excessive sunlight. In the end, we have a complex structure that is both social and integrated to nature which is a working combo for us!