2009 RAIA Queensland Architecture Awards - Queensland State Commendation for Residential Architecture: Multiple Housing.

These houses have a unique identity generated by careful consideration of environmental issues during the design process. The intention was to question the "usual", look closely at performance and construction and provide the best, not necessarily the standard, economical outcomes.

Philosophically the design approach is based on simplicity (which does not mean a lack of sophistication), honesty, clarity, appreciation of natural processes and valuing (i.e. appreciating) the materials and spaces around us. The houses are not intended as commodities but as the products of honest thought and making (see Practice>Philosophy>Shibui, Henry David Thoreau etc).

It is important to note that the design responses to the issues of energy, materials and water and the interactions between them, largely generated the aesthetics of the place. That is, the forms, textures, patterns and colours of the houses have a basis in practical decisions rather than stylistic ones.

The houses and the place they form are consequently intended to communicate, explicitly and implicitly, the underlying environmental issues on which the design is based.