Among the tall apartments and bustling hubbub of Brisbane suburb Newstead lies the inconspicuous studio of award-winning architect Shaun Lockyer. His custom-designed homes transport you to spaces that are at once bold and uniquely constructed while also soft and completely immersive. A dichotomy perfectly realised. For this journal, we spoke with Shaun Lockyer himself for an inside take on his unique approach to his designer homes.
Aesthetics: The Outcome not The Goal
Shaun is the first to point out that the aesthetic of their designs seems to take the least amount of focus.
‘The aesthetics of a building are the outcome and not the goal.’
What is the goal? A building with a strong connection to the world around it and the landscape it sits in, achieved by focusing on practicality.
Known for their use of voids and open spaces, these things serve a purpose, there to encourage further connection. ‘Voids like to be engaged with,’ Shaun says. These elements that play with light and air often look like balconies or benches, anything that cultivates the relationship between home and human.
‘Where houses are usually experienced in landscape format, voids can create a portrait perspective by adding a vertical dimension.’
In experience, the practical comes first with the drama and aesthetic aspects following naturally. While Shaun remains ‘hopeful’ about the outcomes, his work speaks for itself.
Landscaping: An Immersive Experience
‘As weird as it might sound, we see the design of the house as one element of the design environment, which is ultimately what we care most about.’
Contextualising the design within the existing and planned landscape is critical, not only from a ground plane perspective but on other planes as well. To create an immersive environment, window boxes and setbacks are used.
Furthering that thought, Shaun says, ‘If people remember our houses by the plants and landscape then we see that as a good thing. If a building is defined by its landscaping, then it’s blending with its environment.’
It comes back to the heart of their philosophy.
‘We want to design spaces that engage with the world around it.’
This approach is apparent in every finished project, with the bold designs and concrete elements, naturally softened and more approachable through consciously positioned landscaping and incorporated greenery.
It’s an approach that makes a home a transportive oasis, where work, stress and the busyness of urban life are left at the property’s edge.
Designing: A Happy Alchemy
Shaun loves the challenge of problem solving. Each project holds a balance of needs versus wants. The challenge, as Shaun says, is ‘finding the happy alchemy between budget and constraints and vision.’
Designing restorations of old Queenslanders is a unique challenge unto itself, but one that Shaun and his team make look easy. With an existing structure, Shaun says, ‘Sometimes the character is an obstacle we work around or need to add to and sometimes that character is prevalent, and we work around and respect it.’
It comes back to the client’s own vision for preservation versus modernising, and the structural ability of what they hope to achieve.
‘The way we see it, the more we embrace history and respond to it in a contemporary way, the richer the project is for it.’
Within modern contexts lie abstract design requests of those with singular requirements of their new home. Shaun notes that many of these requests are increasingly related to health and wellness. From ideas that address sleeping patterns, or meditation and wellness spaces, they have designed everything from ice baths to saunas, home gyms to hyperbaric chambers.
One of the more unusual requests? A high-altitude training room.
‘We recently designed a high-altitude cycle training room with a big-screen TV hooked up to special software that parallels the experience of riding hill climbs of the Tour de France which thins the air in the room, so your body is responding and training at the relevant altitude.’
Whether it’s the expected—like gaming rooms, internal golf ranges and home theatres—or the unusual—like organic coal cooking facilities, gun rooms, and butchery areas for acreage properties—Shaun and his team rise to the challenge and deliver these requests in stunning packages.
With Sean Lockyer Architects, a home is how we make it.
Building: Trust and Relationships
With impressive one-off designs, finding the right team to bring these designs to life is essential. Shaun notes, ‘As cliché as it is to say, collaboration is a massive part of what we do, and the builders are seminal to that.’
His solution? Long term relationships. With builders who have developed twenty-plus homes for the Lockyer team, the communication, trust, and understanding between designer and builder run deep.
‘We’re trying to become more efficient, cost-effective, and innovative with our processes, and the only way to do that is with a collaborative team mentality.’
Thankfully, Shaun says it’s easier now than it was twenty years ago to find people who are not only capable but who share the vision and enthusiasm for this kind of work. Shaun says,
‘Guys like Dayne, who have a track record, appetite, and work ethic for these types of projects, make them both possible and a joy.’
Bringing designs like these to life requires a mindset that sees complexities as opportunities instead of obstacles. And when it’s approached that way? Every build becomes a privilege.
