New home design — Bells Beach, Jan Juc

Some projects are more personal than others. This one is Jeremy's own home — designed for his family on five acres of bushland just behind Bells Beach, one of the most iconic surf breaks in the world.

Buying on the Surf Coast is complex. Overlays, BAL ratings, vegetation constraints, and planning restrictions can dramatically affect what a property is worth and what you can do with it. Most buyers find this out after they've signed. We help you find it out before.

Call Jeremy now: 0402 952 810

The design challenge

The site is spectacular but unforgiving. Five acres of native bushland in a Bushfire Management Overlay zone, with significant indigenous vegetation that couldn't be touched and strict requirements for fire-resistant construction. The brief was to create a home that felt completely embedded in the landscape — not clearing the bush to build a house, but weaving a house into the bush.

Siting and structure

The home was positioned through careful analysis of the site's vegetation, finding a natural clearing that allowed construction without removing a single significant tree. The building form is low and horizontal, sitting beneath the tree canopy rather than rising above it. From the road, it is almost invisible — which was exactly the intention.

Materials

Externally, every material choice was driven by fire resistance: steel, hardiplank, and metal roofing — all in dark, bush-recessive tones. Inside, the palette reverses: a warm sea of Australian hardwood timbers on floors, ceilings, and joinery creates a richly textured interior that contrasts with the austere exterior. The effect is of emerging from the bush into genuine warmth.

The studio

A separate building was designed as Jeremy's architecture and music studio — a deliberate separation of work and home life that the five-acre site made possible. The studio sits further into the bush, connected to the main house by a simple path through the trees.

The result

A home that was genuinely a delight to live in — embedded in the Bells Beach landscape, thermally comfortable, fire-safe, and completely specific to its extraordinary site.

Building on a bush block or in a Bushfire Management Overlay on the Surf Coast? Call Jeremy on 0402 952 810 — this is exactly the kind of project we design for.

info

prev / next

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

Bells Beach Bush House

New home design — Bells Beach, Jan Juc