Home Designs · Stories

Everything to read.

Every home and every guide, newest first. A home's story says how it came together and what the Studio does with it; a guide is about one thing every home has to decide.

12stories
A butterfly roof over dark steel walls, a rainwater tank at the low point, red earth and vinesDesign Design · Hot dryButterfly roof on the MurrayA steel house outside Mildura under a butterfly roof that sends every drop of rain to one tank, around a shaded courtyard.Mildura, VIC · 3 bed · Butterfly roof Red brick and a dutch gable, a timber verandah with fretwork, the hill rising behindDesign Design · Cool and alpineFederation, and a new wingA brick Federation house in Hobart kept as it was at the front, with a new timber wing behind it that turns to the winter sun.Hobart, TAS · 3 bed · Dutch gable roof White weatherboards under a broad gable, a deep verandah across the front, the dunes behindDesign Design · SubtropicalHamptons by the dunesWhite boards, a broad gable and a pool behind the dunes at Byron Bay: the Hamptons look, drawn for a subtropical coast.Byron Bay, NSW · 4 bed · Gable roof A steel gable on a steep block, the house stepping down the hill in two levelsDesign Design · TemperateA metal roof in the hillsA modern home in the Perth Hills drawn for a bushfire rating without the bunker look: steel roof, screened deck, dark steel cladding.Perth, WA · 4 bed · Gable roof Rammed earth walls under a wide hip roof, a verandah three metres deep along the northDesign Design · Hot dryRammed earth, deep verandahA country home outside Alice Springs that holds the night's cool: thick earth walls, a sheltered courtyard, small windows to the west.Alice Springs, NT · 4 bed · Hip roof A hip roof with deep eaves over a raised timber house, the hill falling away behindDesign Design · TropicalBreezeway on the hillA Queenslander's ideas in a new house above Cairns: one room deep, a breezeway through the middle, a hip roof for cyclone country.Cairns, QLD · 3 bed · Hip roof A charcoal gable with a cedar door and a big window in the gable endGuide RoofsRoofs, and what each one is for.The eight roofs the Studio draws, from skillion to sawtooth, and where each one earns its place: cyclone country, snow, a hot west, a narrow block.6 min · Sept 2026 A sunken lounge that looks across the valleyGuide The blockWhat a sloping block changes.Most of the cost of a sloping block is decided before a wall goes up. How the plan, the floor and the roof answer a slope, and what to ask before you buy.6 min · Sept 2026 A deck that sits over the canopyGuide ClimateWhich climate zone is my block in?Australia builds in eight climate zones. Here is what each one asks of a house, which towns HWD already knows, and what the Studio does the moment it hears where you are.5 min · Sept 2026 A flat-roofed upper storey over timber screens, at duskDesign Design · SubtropicalFlat roof, timber screensTwo storeys under a flat roof on a flat Brisbane block, with timber battens screening the glass and a kitchen that opens onto the deck.Brisbane, QLD · 4 bed · Flat roof A charcoal gable with a cedar door and a big window in the gable endDesign Design · Cool and alpineCharcoal gable, cedar warmthA broad gable to the street and dark boards outside, on a frost-prone block outside Ballarat. Timber and green tile inside.Ballarat, VIC · 3 bed · Gable roof A low skillion over pale render, the garage tucked to one sideDesign Design · TemperatePale render, low skillionQuiet, bright and low to the ground above an Adelaide Hills valley. Pale stone inside, warm timber where you touch it.Adelaide Hills, SA · 3 bed · Skillion roof

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