OxBow Eden

OXBOW EDEN “Something special. Not out-there. Timeless.” Our client’s first words to encapsulate their vision — and our departure point for a design that harmoniously draws together these elements by emulating nature itself. To embody and extend the vision of a house at one with its site, our design process became a unique collaboration between nature, architecture, cultural relevance and technology. Algorithmically-driven digital tools allowed us to emulate the landscape’s flowing forms, digging past the established New Zealand vernacular into a more primal connection to place. Oxbow Eden sits atop an urban clifftop in Palmerston North, its southern views taking in the Hokowhitu Lagoon and the Manawatu golf course. Nature forms an oxbow-shaped lagoon when a meandering river curve splits off from its parent and becomes landlocked. The spatial variability of Oxbow Eden’s plan-form mirrors this relationship between river and orphaned lagoon, with landscaping naturally extending the home’s footprint. The same biophilic approach creates the terrain-like contours of the double curved roof, meticulously calculated to cantilever out from the house and deliver passive solar warmth and light in a seasonal cycle. The site and brief delivered a winged typology, each wing unfurling from The Boulevard, its central foyer . This focal space references indigenous Māori creation myths of the relationship between Ranginui, Sky Father and Papatūānuku, Earth Mother. It unites interior and exterior and, through its sunken internal garden and skylight oculus, earth and sky. Living, dining and kitchen form the nucleus of the house, augmenting the natural landscape with a curved cedar ceiling that echoes the roof form. Throughout the home, the dialogue with the land forms carefully choreographed experiences enhanced by the warm tactility of cedar ceilings, oak floors and rendered walls. The roof and lagoon-facing walls are finished with naturally sourced slate rainscreen which, alongside thermally modified stained timber battens, creates a monolithic whole that feels part of the land and is timeless in both its aesthetics and its whole-of-life cost.