More before and after

The house on the cover of our current issue is the old Thorndon Bowling Club in Wellington, for which architects Mary Daish and Liz Wallace designed a recent renovation. The building had already been turned into a residence in the 1990s, but Mary and Liz were called in to reconfigured the house for new owners, Tim and Fiona Arbuckle and their three children. The shots below best demonstrate the subtle but highly effective changes Liz and Mary introduced.


The 'Before' picture below shows the home's previous kitchen, which was located in a small space adjacent to a sundeck, while the room on the right contained a study.



In the renovation, the study was removed and the deck was filled in and replaced with a sunny area with window seats, as you can see in the image below. A new deck was created on the northwestern corner of the top floor, with stairs connecting to the garden below. The photographs are by Paul McCredie.


This view shows how the kitchen was designed to occupy the space formerly taken up by the study, which also allowed for more windows to let more light into the centre of this large room. The kitchen table and bench seats were custom-made for the space.