The house occupies a lovely site on a knoll above a stand of regenerating kānuka, with a generous view over the estuary to rolling hills and native bush. It gets sun all day; while there are neighbouring houses on either side, the grassy paddock across the road is a reserve, preserving viewshafts at either end. “I liked the idea of being really closed off from the street – revealing nothing,” says Peacocke of the front wall. “But then you walk in the door and it’s all revealed.” 

Because it sits further back, the house is out of step with its neighbours, which allows it to borrow those adjoining views and create a sense of expansion. There’s an immediacy to the outlook, borne of sitting on the edge. “We had to do quite a bit of underpinning,” says Peacocke of the siting, “but I think it was worth it – just to feel like you’re on that edge.” 

That brick wall snakes inside, and wends its way through the bedroom wing, which includes three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a generous laundry and a mudroom for surfboards and bikes in place of a garage – because, let’s face it, no one parks a car in their garage, right? The wall was crucial to the design – both from the street, but also in the plan; it almost feels like a remnant of a previous building, off which the living pavilion hangs.

It also gives a small house two very different spatial experiences. The bedroom wing feels hunkered down, close to the ground, with the floor stepping down slightly in the main bedroom; the brick forms a thick, comforting wall. Windows are smaller here, and carefully placed for privacy and to modulate the light. The living spaces, by contrast, are glassy and lightweight, with floor-to-ceiling sliding doors and timber screens.  “It was a way to ground this quite feathery form,” Peacocke says, “and lead you into that view. I wanted something to run through right into the interior and bring the landscape in.” 

That “feathery” form gives you somewhere to go, whatever the weather or time of day. There’s a generous deck on the estuary side, and a sheltered courtyard to the southwest, allowing glorious west-coast afternoon sun to filter through timber battens. Throughout the house, Peacocke has rubbed and softened the edges with a dance of push-me pull-you – the shower in the main bedroom’s ensuite bathroom pops out under the eave, creating a glassy experience of showering in the garden. In a bedroom, the brick wall pushes along past the end of the room to produce a private garden moment. Courtyards, decks and screens provide shelter from rain and wind.  

The effect is both purposeful and romantic – practical and delightful. When you come back from a surf, for example, you go around the side of the house, rinse off under the outdoor shower, then step in under a sheltered porch. You put your surfboards in the store, rinse your wetsuit in the laundry: eventually, you wind up in the living room. It’s a progression that has been carefully thought through, and was a key part of the sisters’ brief in this surfing-mad town. “I imagined a retreat we’d all come together in one day,” says Peacocke. “We’re a really close family – we’re all in on this together.”