MARAETAI HOUSE | COASTAL NEW-BUILD

The best coastal architecture knows when to stand back. At Maraetai, the light, the water and the particular quality of stillness are already doing the work. The job of a coastal home is to get out of the way and let it in.

Macfie Architecture designed this contemporary new-build around that principle. The brief called for a low-maintenance coastal retreat, a home that would embrace the setting without being consumed by it, and that would look as right in thirty years as it does today.

Traditional weatherboards ground the exterior in the coastal vernacular. Inside, walls of blonde vertical timber bring warmth and texture without competing with the views beyond. Expansive sliders run throughout the living spaces, dissolving the boundary between inside and out so the beach is always present, whatever the weather.

Four bedrooms, three bathrooms and two entertainment areas, one indoor and one outdoor, give the home the generosity a coastal retreat demands - room enough for family, for guests, and for the long unhurried days Maraetai was made for.

Project Scope - concept design, developed design, resource consent, building consent, on-site monitoring

Photography by Tori Hayley