Recessed into the Pohutukawa lined cliffs and appearing to effortlessly float upon the water’s edge of Auckland’s Herne Bay, stands the Boat House. Designed to provide the clients with a space to store and launch their boats from the base of their property, the Boat House offers an elegant solution to access and connection to the Waitemata Harbor.
Inspired by the traditional gable house, the Boat House by Michael Cooper Architects is comprised of an asymmetrical form suited to house the client’s powerboat and Laser yacht fully rigged. The refined exterior material palette of dark corrugate cladding allows the building to respectfully integrate into the cliff’s edge, while the purpleheart hardwood decking effortlessly descends into the water’s edge.
Translucent cladding lines the front and rear of the building, emulating sails of a yacht when the doors are open, and subsequently a ships lantern when closed at night. The interior architecture of the boathouse is refined to elegantly integrate functionality and beauty within a maritime environment. The interior is lined with Meranti ply and custom shelving, while laminated timber portal frames, reminiscent of typical boat construction visually define the ground floor boat storage from the mezzanine workspace.
From the inception of this project, timber was a natural choice of materiality to use throughout the project for both the structural and architectural design. Timber has an embedded history of use in boat building and projects surrounding water, whereby the qualities of it being relatively lightweight and durable allowed the project to progress efficiently and with minimal impact to the surrounding environment. In addition, timber framing members were pre-fabricated off-site, and delivered to site via barge.
“While designing the Boat House, we were also conscious of the risk of material being lost to the harbor, thus wanted to rule out the use of concrete. Due to the unique nature and location of this project, we wanted the Boat House to reference maritime architecture in a simple and elegant manner. The use of timber throughout the project provided the perfect language to represent this,” stated Michael Cooper, Director, Michael Cooper Architects.
While timber is a durable material synonymous with construction in New Zealand, there were naturally precautions that needed to be taken for use of it within a marine environment. To protect the timber from decay, the bottom plates of the Boat House’s walls were raised from the decking, as well as the base of the frame raised on stainless steel shoes; this prevented any water from sitting against the timber.
Another threat to the structural integrity of the timber used was the potential invasion of the Teredo worm, a species of saltwater clam present in the Waitemata Harbor that drill passages though timber, causing decay. Intricate detailing as well as the specific selection of a hardwood timber species was required to avoid invasion. Due to the harsh marine environment of the site, there was risk of the timber warping during erection on site, thus glulaminated portal frames were used for their stability.
“As with all of our projects, we were delighted to provide the clients with a beautiful design that reflects their desires. We thoroughly enjoyed working on such a unique project, and are more than pleased with the outcome,” concluded Cooper.
