c1965 Don Cowey Remuera

With a respectful renovation, architect Julian Guthrie maximises a modernist home that efficiently fits five bedrooms into its modest footprint.

- Henry Oliver

A couple of years ago, architect Julian Guthrie was browsing through the newspaper when something caught his eye – a real-estate listing for a mid-60s modernist home in Remuera, Auckland, by the architect Don Cowey. “I saw it in the Herald – a photo taken from down on the lawn looking up at it, seeing the flat roof lines and the modernisty kind of thing with an expansive lawn,” he says, explaining how he and his partner Georgie, each with two children from previous relationships, had not seriously considered living together. “And when I read it had five bedrooms, I thought, ‘That's perfect!’ And I just immediately loved the house when we walked in. All the detailing. It’s so well preserved.”

Despite loving the house, Guthrie assumed it would be difficult to win at auction in Auckland’s boiling property market. But no-one bid, so Guthrie and Georgie made an offer and, to their surprise, they got it. The house was “basically original”, but “immensely overgrown,” he says. “You couldn’t see any trees or any skyline beyond the hedge. It was very gloomy with a big plastic roof over the deck, tinting film over the windows and chocolate brown carpet, so it was just dark, dark, dark. But it was actually due-north facing – with floor-to-ceiling glass.”

As soon as they bought the house, Guthrie started planning its renovation, which, nearly a year later, he describes as a work in progress. “I just loved the bones of it. So I looked past the carpet and the paint and curtains – all the stuff that was masking it. When you pull all the crap out, it immediately looks good.”