This New Zealand Beach House Has Us Jonesing for a Vacation
This article originally appeared on The Field, an online magazine devoted to good design and the great outdoors. If you like what you see, visit thefieldmag.com for more.
As anyone who's seen the Lord of the Rings trilogy and salivated over the beauty of its setting knows, New Zealand is a land of extremes. One humble part of its stunning landscape that has largely remained out of the international spotlight is the bach, or beach house, examples of which dot the county's enormous coastline. Typically modest in size and historically used by the middle class, bachs do not often make it onto tourists' must-see lists.
But they haven't seen the Castle Rock House, a modern take on the New Zealand vacation home. Designed by Auckland-based Herbst Architects-founded and run by a husband-and-wife team originally from South Africa-the minimalist structure is perched on top of a bluff overlooking the Whangarei Heads on the North Island. The structure's defining features are the two pavilions (one for sleeping, one for living and entertaining); and the natural materials like wood-slat walls and roofing, which work with the open design to bring the outdoors in. Or, in the case of its open-air shower, the indoors out.
Rounding out the design are features like a large outdoor fireplace and built-in barbecue on the rear deck, and a wood-burning stove in the inner lounge. With a hilltop beach house this great, who needs to actually be on the beach?
