Great design doesn’t have a postcode. And sometimes the most inspiring ideas for how we build and renovate here in Queensland come from the other side of the world.
This is one of those projects.
On a wooded hillside road on the outskirts of Bath, UK, London and South West-based practice Forgeworks Architects has completed a home renovation that stopped us in our tracks. Not because it’s showy — quite the opposite. A House of Wood Shingle is a masterclass in restraint, material intelligence, and the kind of thinking that asks a simple but powerful question before a single decision is made: what’s already worth keeping?
For anyone navigating a renovation in Queensland, where character homes and heritage overlays present their own particular set of challenges, there’s plenty here to take note of.
Starting with what already works
The project began with a neglected bungalow that hadn’t been touched in decades. Poor insulation, low-quality finishes, and no real sense of spatial ambition. What it did have was a remarkable position — perched above the city with sweeping views across Bath to Bristol, the Severn Estuary, and on clear days, into Wales. And it had walls. Good, solid, thermally massive walls that were perfectly capable of doing their job if someone gave them the chance.
Forgeworks founder Chris Hawkins describes the practice’s approach as “fabric first” — a philosophy that begins not with a vision for what a building could become, but with an honest reckoning of what it already is. Rather than clearing the site and starting fresh, the team wrapped the existing structure in high-performance insulation and Canadian blue label cedar shingles, retaining the building’s thermal mass and embodied energy while delivering something that looks, from the street, entirely new.
It’s an approach worth considering closer to home. Here in Queensland, we have no shortage of ageing character homes, mid-century brick houses, and tired suburban dwellings that are written off far too quickly. Sometimes the most sustainable — and most interesting — decision is to stay and transform.
Big moves hidden inside modest gestures
The most dramatic intervention is the roofline. Forgeworks inverted the existing roof pitch, creating a distinctive silhouette that reads with quiet confidence from the street while unlocking generous volume within. Loft spaces were carved into the existing structure, adding a double-height hallway and a mono-pitched kitchen and dining room that feel far more expansive than the original footprint would ever suggest.
This is a recurring theme in the best renovation work: restraint on the outside, richness within. The kind of design that reveals itself gradually, room by room, rather than announcing everything at once. It’s a quality we see in the finest Queensland renovations too, where modest street frontages regularly conceal something spectacular out the back.
The logic of light and living
Relocating the entrance to the side of the house was a move that sounds minor but changed everything. It allowed a clean separation between the living and sleeping zones, giving each its own rhythm and quality of light. West-facing living areas catch long afternoon and evening sun, framed by generous windows and sliding doors that open to a terrace with valley views beyond. Bedrooms and bathrooms at the rear are quieter, catching the softer morning light. The main bedroom, positioned in a compact new extension, enjoys natural light across the whole day.
Colour and material with genuine conviction
The interiors were developed in close collaboration with Richardson Studio founder Celia McCarthy, who is also the project’s client — a pairing that clearly produced something special. The material and colour choices are confident without being aggressive. Pink and green terrazzo in the kitchen anchors a palette that ripples through the whole house: dusty pink in the main bedroom, soft black in the entrance lobby, and a jolt of bright yellow in the hallway that stops you in your tracks in the best possible way.
Natural materials do the heavy lifting throughout. Lime-plastered walls, exposed spruce beams, and engineered oak flooring provide warmth and texture, while wood wool acoustic panels in the kitchen and living soffit add both character and practical performance. Bold colour and honest material: it’s a combination that translates beautifully regardless of hemisphere.
What we can take from it
A House of Wood Shingle is inspiring not because it’s exotic or unattainable, but because the thinking behind it is completely transferable. The questions Forgeworks asked of this Bath bungalow are the same questions worth asking of any renovation: what’s already here that’s worth honouring? How do we add volume without adding excess? How does light move through this home across a day, and are we making the most of it?
Whether you’re working with a pre-war Queenslander, a mid-century brick home, or a character cottage anywhere across Queensland, the principles are the same. Build less. Think more. Choose materials that will age beautifully. And trust that restraint, applied with real intelligence, nearly always produces something more interesting than ambition alone.
Architect: Forgeworks Architects | forgeworks.co.uk | @forgeworks.uk
