This office-cum-residence developed its form based on the site contours. Situated on a boulder rock bed with street access on either sides of the site at two acutely different levels, the character of the building is an ode to the precipitous fall of the contoured terrain. Instead of flattening the rock-bed, the quarters are gently sculpted into the thin remains of the rocky terrain.
The volumes of the building create multiple levels of use , even as the retaining shear walls hold parts of the dangerous hill-rock . Challenged with the decimation of the rocks on all neighbouring sites causing alarming instability to the rock beds within the site, the client and the design team braved the risks in designing each footing and wall both gently and firmly in a desperate attempt to retain the original rocks underneath. Keeping the scale of the office on one street and the residence on the other street is an aspect of the design.
