Casa Piva
Casa Piva is discreetly sited off a quiet suburban laneway in Malvern East. Its prevailing sense of privacy and intimacy is created through a series of inwardly oriented courtyards that surround the house, forming a cocoon at its interface with its neighbours.
From the street, the house’s white brick, almost windowless façade is austere. Entering through a modest door from the laneway, one encounters a large, enclosed forecourt in granite cobblestone, with two trees growing up through an aperture in the roofline above.
It is an inward-looking building within its dense urban setting, taking many of its cues from the owners’ Italian heritage, reflected in its simplicity and carefully curated materials and details.
A single arch leads from the forecourt into the first of a series of compressed, low lit spaces, staging the entry sequence. The kitchen is the first indication of warmth. Beyond it the second and larger internal courtyard is gradually revealed, and the living spaces open out to daylight.
Contained on all sides by the house, the internal courtyard combines hard landscaping with gradually established planting, creating a sheltered garden connected to the main living spaces.
The interiors, composed of brick, timber and travertine, are inviting and strangely reminiscent of an older time and place.
The joinery is detailed to read as individually crafted furniture pieces, the grain turned in different directions to create deliberate variation. It reaches moments of intensity in the study, the kitchen and the master ensuite, where full rooms are lined in antique oak, with functional elements fully integrated.
The architecture is rationalised and balanced against it are the softer elements of the rooms. Textiles, art and objects have been gathered over time. The oversized plaster ring bird light in the living room and the Perspex tables that display books were custom designed rather than sourced, and the sofa is covered in vintage Missoni fabric.
A softly detailed stair rises beneath a skylight to the private rooms above, drawing light into the ground floor entry space.
As the home of architect and director Andrew Piva, Casa Piva presented a more introspective design process. The brief turned inward, considering how spaces could nourish and support his family’s rituals and ways of living. Architectural references spanning different places and periods are quietly reinterpreted, their presence deliberately subliminal and open to interpretation.
