Dowel House

Dowel House is the internal refurbishment of a single-fronted terrace in Melbourne, where a humble timber dowel becomes the organising idea for the whole interior. The existing layout was retained, with a central study designed to flex between a third bedroom and a work space. An existing clerestory skylight was reworked to become a focal point above the dining area, its operable louvres and shading devices opening and closing to tune the daylight.

FMD Architects took the practical need to operate those louvres and turned it into an opportunity. A timber dowel serves as the rod that opens the skylight while also forming a decorative chandelier above the dining table. The chandelier is reconfigurable: coloured elements signal which dowels can be removed and repositioned, so the display can be changed over time. From there the dowel extends through the home, appearing as an art display device, shelving and support legs for the concrete benches, as well as display ledges for the client's extensive art collection, door pulls, towel rails and wall hooks.

The interior palette is drawn from the art collection itself, personalising the response and tying the scheme together. Those colours reappear on the chandelier and on dowel elements that punctuate the rooms. Circular cut-outs in the sliding study panel, the robes, the skylight panelling and the television cupboard repeat the dowel motif across every space. The result is a consistent design language whose function shifts from room to room, blurring the line between the practical, the decorative and the artistic, and creating a series of spaces in constant dialogue with the changing collection on display.

The project measures 134 m2 on a 196 m2 site, completed in 2015 over a single level.

Credits: FMD Architects, design director Fiona Dunin with graduate architect Alice Edmonds. Photography by Peter Bennetts.