Think of a crofthouse and you're likely to imagine a remote white cottage in the Scottish Highlands with views of the undulating landscape and windswept coast beyond. Perhaps even, the perfect bolt hole...
Well, er, scratch that.
Here's a crofthouse with a difference. Yes, it's white. Yes, it has amazing views. But this startlingly modern crofthouse is in Australia.
The futuristic building - a grand design that would make Kevin McCloud proud - was built by architect James Stockwell and is situated on the south coast of Victoria, near Inverloch, Australia.
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The house recently won the prestigious Allan and Beth Coldicutt Award for Sustainable Architecture in the Victorian Architecture Awards and 'forms a protected garden from which peripheral vision of the sea and sky is permitted by tapered facades'. So there.
'The owners' request was to have a full outlook to, and shelter from, the coastal vistas in all directions and to be part of the landscape,' says James Stockwell.
'They wanted an unobtrusive home that would blend in with a magnificent natural environment.
'The design creates a shelter in an exposed environment, containing all the necessary activities of domestic life in an uncompromised way.'
Crofthouse has been constructed from natural and locally sourced materials, including Victorian ash timber and bluestone. And this state of the art home is eco-friendly too, with its passive solar building design and double glazing.
The Victorian Architecture Awards said: 'The project was a clear leader. Throughout design and construction, Crofthouse presented new design ideas that offered a more sustainable future for the planet.'
With its curved pebble-shaped design and sleek interior, this crofthouse might be a world away from the Highlands, but we think it's a thing of beauty.
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