Consonant Construction

Closed and exposed, the Concord House is a testament of love for concrete and a creative freedom to design.

- Sarah Nh Vogeler

There is a love affair set in concrete, right here in Concord, Sydney. Completed in May 2016, the low maintenance, contemporary four-bedroom house has been designed to showcase the owners’ love for concrete and to provide more space and greater amenity for their family of four. The Concord House_I may look like a typical minimalist home like many of Le Corbusier’s, but it goes beyond its utilitarian concrete façade.

Conceived by Ian Bennett from Studio Benicio, a boutique contemporary residential design practice located in Newport Beach on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, the studio specialises in all facets of residential design and documentation for new dwellings, alterations, interior design and industrial practice. The brief was to create a new contemporary house that would make better use of the existing site than the tired, red brick cottage. The clients own and operate a form work business, which in turn has garnered them a great love and appreciation for concrete and wanted their home to feature this throughout.

The challenge lays in designing something quite contemporary, including all items of the brief, which included keeping the existing pool, without any flourishes that would make the home non-compliant – all on a modestly sized site.

Due to past struggles and time delays with Council, the clients requested we use the ‘Complying Development’ approval system to expedite the process, which requires buildings to meet strict standards to ensure a fast- tracked approvals process. The process applies to construction such as new homes (up to two storeys) renovations or extensions to an existing home, development of a ‘granny flat’, building a swimming pool and decks.