Houzz Tour: Updated and Expanded 1940s Cottage Keeps Its Charm
With a smart design and clever reuse of space and materials, this Australian home now suits the fun and sociable lifestyle of its owner.
After years of house hunting, building designer Janik Dalecki stumbled on a suburb a short distance outside of Perth, Australia, that had great transportation links, lively buzz, charming tree-lined streets and, most important, older homes in his price range. “I was looking for a property that I could add my own touch to, but I found it very hard to find anything that had enough space [for an addition] or that hadn’t been semi-renovated or [added on to] already, usually badly,” he says.
“I was attracted to this cottage because of its run-down, untouched condition and the huge amount of potential it offered. This project could be seen as a rebuild within the existing bones of the original house,” the designer says. “We’ve completely changed the layout and function of the internal rooms, as well as extended to the rear and side, but kept the integral look and feel of the cottage intact.”
Who lives here: Building designer Janik Dalecki
Location: Maylands, Western Australia
Size: 1,184 square feet (110 square meters); three bedrooms, two bathrooms
Building designer: Dalecki Design
Renovation cost: $144,000, including all building work, fixtures and landscaping
Awards: Winner of the 2016 Building Designers Association of Western Australia award for best residential alteration and addition up to $190,000. Winner of the 2016 National Association of Building Designers award for best residential alteration and addition up to $265,000.
Dalecki’s goal was to work with the property’s existing structure but improve its overall energy performance. At the front, the existing siding was replaced with James Hardie Scyon Linea clapboard siding, retaining the heritage of the ’40s design while allowing the highest-performing insulation to be added at the same time. New wood-framed windows with double-paned glass replaced the old aluminum windows, while a new concrete driveway was added beneath a smart pitched-roof carport that replaced the existing lean-to.
Dalecki opted to clad the sides and back of the house in cost-effective, low-maintenance fiber cement board with a textured render finish.