Robin Boyd: 1919—71

Robin Boyd designed the now heritage-listed Walsh Street house, South Yarra, in 1957. Known as Boyd House II, it is now “home” to the Robin Boyd Foundation, established in 2005 to preserve Boyd’s legacy and to continue to foster good design and a broad appreciation of the its social benefits. As well as this, the foundation hosts cultural activities, such as an architectural film program, lectures, intimate musical events and the like.

Built on a small, narrow inner-suburban block, the two pavilions span the block’s width and are separated by a dramatic glass-walled courtyard that is both a light-filled third space and a central focus for this inward-turned building. The spatially flexible, two-storey front pavilion was designed as the adults’ living and entertaining quarters, while the single-storey back pavilion was the children’s quarters. The two are held in a single form by a roofline that drapes in a graceful curve from the double height of one pavilion to the low elevation of the other, with timber-lined ceilings over the pavilions and spaced cabling across the courtyard.