Bluff House / Inarc Architects

Bluff House on the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria is a holiday home which confidently addresses the challenges of a dual interface with a rugged coastline and the neighbouring rural countryside. The building sits on top of an escarpment in the seaside township of Flinders. The view is world class, serene and bucolic to the rural north and to the south a brutal seascape over nearby Bass Straight. The site is located on a transition point between two geologies. This has resulted in a land slip affected site, most dangerous at a point where the site views are at their best. Deep bored piers anchor the building to the crest of the allotment at ground floor level whilst at the upper level, the floor plate cantilevers over the steep terrain below. The first floor plan is a linear arrangement of spaces kinked around existing trees. 


The cantilevered corners of the living room and main bedroom give the feeling of detachment from the building, a feeling of leaning over the edge.The building has two faces. The benign northern orientation has views over paddocks defined by rows of pine windbreaks with rolling hills in the foreground. This facade is clad in tailored narrow blackbutt timber boards and reads as an angular but warm and welcoming timber house. The more inclement southern orientation has resulted in a brooding and sharp composition of dark painted steel and glass. The two facades are not seen together yet co-exist. The geometry resulting from the angles of the building offer a multitude of indoor and outdoor refuges from the sun and wind.