The grandeur of Karijini National Park inspired the look and feel of this Australian home
Karijini House, designed by Gritt Studio, blends drama and tranquillity in a Perth suburb
A new private home draws on the drama and natural feel of the Karijini National Park, set within the vast, open landscapes of Western Australia. The project, fittingly titled Karijini House, was designed by Tenille Teakle, design director at Studio Gritt. Her goal? 'To create a home that offers the same sense of solitude and connection to nature [as the national park],' she explains.
Explore a house inspired by Karijini National Park
The property is located in the Perth suburb of Wembley Downs. Inspired by the materiality, tactility and wild feel of the Karijini nature, the 409 sq m house (spanning two above-ground levels and a basement) features 7m-high rammed-earth walls and large glass windows that connect it to the outdoors at every turn.
Explaining the connection between her inspiration and the home's context and reality, Teakle writes: 'Horizontal banding in the imperfect and damaged face brick (weathered by age) evokes the carved Karijini rockfaces. The undulating texture of the rammed concrete walls echoes the tactility of the rockface. Burnished concrete floors and soffits are reminiscent of blackened sand.
'Upstairs the lighter hemp render and palette replicate the experience of re-emerging onto the plains from a hike down the gorge, being bathed in natural daylight, no longer in the dark and dank and mysterious. Large, banded iron boulders feature as architectural monuments, sparking curiosity and storytelling.'
The designer and her team sought to craft a home that feels like a sanctuary, a solitary cocoon, cool and calm – making the everyday appear like a holiday, even in Karijini House's dense urban and suburban broader setting. '[It evokes] the experience of traversing a gorge,' she says.
The creative team took into account sustainability principles, as well as questions around provenance and longevity. As a result, the home features recycled rammed concrete walls, repurposed second-hand local materials, and a rich green garden of native planting that allow the local wildlife to thrive.
Teakle highlights: 'To distil the Karijini experience into identifying features, they would be scale, grandeur, light and shade, horizontal banding and privacy.'
