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Preceding pages, right and facing page: A glazed turret with a stained-glass roof forms a rooftop entry to a new summer house on this steep property. The entry replicates the octagonal shape of a turret on the Victorian-style house, which was retro-fitted with Art Deco windows.

Above: The summer house was designed to provide a link between the main house and the garden below. A water feature runs alongside the lower terrace.

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Houses built on steep sites often have little connection to the garden below. Such was the case with this Victorian-era house, but a novel solution has found a way to link the house and garden – and provide new spa facilities at the same time.

Architect Matt Coltart of Craig & Coltart Architects says the owners wanted to be able to go out to the garden with -out having to walk down the

existing paths and ramps.“We had to somehow

bring the garden back up to the house,” he says. “This led to the idea of a turf deck – a rooftop garden on top of a summer house, with a glazed entry and stairwell down into the new structure.”

Coltart says the owners wanted a modern summer house, but it needed to look as though it could have been

What lies beneathConcealed by a rooftop garden, this new summer house mimics the form

of the octagonal turrets on the Victorian-era house behind

Architect: Matt Coltart ANZIA and David Craig ANZIA, Craig & Coltart Architects (Wellington)Builder: Davie Hadfield and Mark Allen, Riverdale Construction ServicesLandscape designer: Jamie Reid, Design MattersArborists: Kerei Thompson; Bark LtdDoors and windows: Timber windows by Cooper Furniture & Joinery; steel windows, copper details and sculpture by Architectural Roof & Facade Innovations, with Fusion EngineeringStained glass windows: Pukerua Glass StudioWindow and door hardware: Allart solid bronze hardware, supplied by FL BoneTile flooring: Travertine from Bramco Granite & MarblePaints and varnishes: Resene; PPG Industrial CoatingsLighting: ECC Lighting & FurnitureHeating: Enersave Products; Abode Air ConditioningSauna: Klafs, from Walrus Spa DesignersKitchen benchtop: CorianKitchen cabinets: Cooper Furniture & Joinery

Story by Colleen HawkesPhotography by Paul McCredie

Facing page, top, lower and above: The summer house was built mainly of concrete, with Sto plaster and tiles, to give a solid feel to the subterranean structure. A large cabbage tree extends up through the roof. The sauna is positioned so the owners can see reflections of the trees in a water feature.

Legend to plans: 1 stairwell, 2 seating area, 3 kitchen, 4 internal garden with tree, 5 shower, 6 bathroom, 7 sauna, 8 spa pool.

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built with the rest of the house. For this reason, an octagonal turret form on the house was repeated in the design, starting with the glazed entry pod on the rooftop garden.

“We dappled the turret form back down the garden, almost like a series of trees. The stairwell in the circulation tower leads down to an octag -onal seating turret and shower room in the summer house and

a circular spa pool and fire pit outdoors,” says Coltart.

“On the lower level, the building mimics the shape of the existing house, but we changed the materiality. In place of weatherboards, we introduced a solid, more robust, monolithic structure, which is penetrated by the light form of the stairwell.”

Coltart says the stained glass on the entry turret reflects

the Victorian appreciation of transitions between elements in nature.

“The stained glass is a decorative expression soften -ing the transition from the steel columns to the glass roof.”

Because the owners wanted to retain an existing magnifi -cent cabbage tree, the summer house was built around this. There is also a water feature that can be seen from the spa.