There are two references at play in this Te Whanganui-a-Tara cabin. The first draws on the clients’ love of hiking, riffing off DOC huts’ robust form and materiality. The second is more subtle, paying homage to the birds of New Zealand by mimicking their colouring – a green body with a warm underbelly.

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The cabin sits in the backyard of a family home in the Wellington hills. After finding themselves short on room, the owners asked Pou Architecture to create a space that could serve multiple functions: office, guest suite, yoga studio, rumpus room – the list could go on. They had a tight budget and timeline, walk-on-only access and a bush-encroached site cut right through the middle by a block wall. Game on.

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Absorbing that retaining wall into the foundation (you catch a glimpse of it through the slatted Hermpac-timber base), the low-maintenance corrugate and Abodo timber form is hitched high up on the site to capture sweeping views across Evans Bay. Wanting to avoid a simple box finish, lead designer Samantha Wallace carved out one corner to allow for an overhanging soffit and deck, then tipped the ceiling up at the back, making room for a mezzanine level. Glazed doors feed out to a narrow wraparound shelter, drawing light and air into the petite 18-square-metre escape.

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Inside, the built-in plywood joinery, walls and ceiling create a warm and enveloping retreat with small windows considerately placed to grasp glimpses through the bush. Predominantly used as a workspace for now, the cabin moonlights as a cosy suite for visiting guests. Inherently versatile and impeccably crafted (particularly impressive when you learn the interior was finished by the clients and their whānau), its name, Cabin_001, has us optimistic this is merely the first of many from Pou Architecture.

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