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North side and driveway, with car port under the first floor slab
joining the bedrooms and beside the bathrooms, are verandahs which ap- pear on the exterior as spaces let into the elevation. These verandahs, be- ing placed between the bathrooms, make for easy access to the plumbing.
The north side of the first floor, with its bare concrete. blank veran- dahs, and small bathroom windows, contrasts with other side, which has 6 ft. high windows along the entire length. These windows separate the floor and roof slabs; there is no struc- ture connecting the two and interrupt- ing the run of glass.
The whole house is air-conditioned with separate units for the various areas. There are ten units on the up- per floor, housed in special concrete structures on top of the roof. These
square shapes, evenly distributed in
two lines along the building, form a distinctive feature of the silhouette of the house.
Another. and more dominant, structure on the roof is the water tank. These concrete shapes change the roof from being a featureless flat finish on the building to an extra level of the design. There are also air-conditioning units housed in the wall under the first floor projection. They project through the wall to the
exterior, and on the outside of them there is a long concrete plank held out from the wall which shields them and makes an architectural feature. The exterior is almost entirely of fairfaced concrete with glass set in it. The sitting and dining rooms on the ground floor have walls largely of concrete, and the first floor has the
Main hall on the ground floor and stairs
floor;
to first dining
room is at the far end
same finish in the corridor. This use of concrete for domestic interiors is very unusual, and one wonders whe- ther it will become grubby in time as it is almost impossible to renovate the surface. At present the effect is pleasing and professional.
The concrete surface of the ex- terior is relieved from plainness in two ways. There is the deliberate shaping and modelling of it, by such means as the slits in the screen wall and the grooves that run all along the fascias of the first floor, and there is the more subtle patterning of the concrete by the surface of the form- work in which it was poured.
The architect formed the grooves and slits in the main supporting wall by means of shaped pieces inside the forms, in order to form a strong break between different pours of concrete. Otherwise there would be a series of unsightly lines separating the different batches of concrete.
Formwork
For the formwork, 4in. wide boards were used throughout, and this gives the overall graining to the concrete. Each board was used twice and then discarded, so that each surface was used once only and the concrete was always poured into new and clean forms. A very good surface has been obtained, in a way that would not be possible on a larger project.
Carpenters accustomed to making interior woodwork were employed to make the forms, and great care was taken to ensure that the forms were correctly aligned and first-class work obtained. A waterproofing com- pound was used in the concrete and a silicone waterproofing coat. which will not change the appearance of the surface in any way, will be applied.
The rooms have a ceiling height of 8ft. which is unusually low in areas like Hong Kong where ceilings are traditionally higher to give some coolness and prevent a shut-in effect. With complete air-conditioning this reasoning is not so valid.
Another reason for the 8ft. dimen- sion is that plywood and similar sheet materials come in boards of this length, and the architect wished to have in some places wooden panelling. reaching from floor to ceiling without any breaks. The framing behind this panelling is made from some of the timber originally used for the forms for concrete. Most of the panelling is on the first floor where the floors are of teak. Downstairs the floors are mainly harder, such as mosaic tiles, and the wall surfaces too are more robust.
The building time for this house was about one year. and it was finished in February of this year. The building time reflects the great care taken over the standard of finish, a high priority where a novel form of construction such as this is in- volved.
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Far East Architect & Builder September, 1966