Simplicity derives from legibility in architecture and design choices, however complexity and narratives overlay interest and meaning behind the design through interwoven relationships between human, nature, and architecture.

The idea of connecting people to nature is highly valued in the realm of architectural design. A crafted separation from nature over the years has resulted in increased health issues and a decline in creativity, and architecture itself has forgone the aesthetic dimension it once had. Architects and urban designers in the present day are reinventing the relationship and proximity between humans and the biological community because an ethical reconnection with the living world around us brings with it benefits physically, socially, psychologically, and emotionally. The implementation of nature and natural systems in common spaces and the edges of built structure has become a solution in softening hard thresholds, establishing transition spaces and natural viewports, to challenge the boundaries between the internal and external, the built and the natural.

Frank Lloyd Wright has always been my inspiration, wherein his Organic Architecture prioritises harmonious relationships between architecture and the natural, inclusive of the use of local materials at its most natural state. The Fallingwater house is a classic precedent of Wright’s, where he blurs the boundaries between the house and the surrounding environment, as the architecture melts into and becomes one with the waterfall and the woods. 

Likewise, I have applied this concept into my Epsilon project, blurring the boundaries of the Microcosm to interact with the immediate context of Brunswick West, mirroring the sport grounds on the north, southern commercial amenities and mid-rise apartments, the adjacent park, and two storey residentials within. 

At the residential scale, in his ‘Interactive Architecture’ talk (MSDatHome), Osamu Nishida (ONdesign) justifies the design intentions of Fika (meaning ‘coffee and snack break’ in Swedish), especially indicative use of the thresholds to divide spaces. Nishida believes “architecture can be influenced by, and influence, its neighbourhood, while still keeping its privacy”. Within, the core and separator of the small house and ceramic shop is a large shelf with exhibited ceramics. The shelf and also the large window at the street interface become thresholds and semi-open connections to connect the home to the neighbourhood.

In the Microcosm, thresholds are also employed at the facade level where the opaque panelised cladding directs openness predominately inwards to establish strong bonds with neighbours and project views into nature within the shared inner courtyard, however signs of habitation are apparent when the panel opens as a window, the verandah acts as a communal in-between space between two clusters, and softened when plants begin to climb the walls. The soft facade within speaks a more old-fashioned language where warm, porous timber architectural elements allow a blurred threshold between the inside and outside, connecting the interior and more private living spaces with the inner courtyard and the people and nature that comes with it.

Porosity and blurred thresholds are common concepts featured in my designs, especially the use of transparent, translucent, porous facade structures, and aesthetics to blur the boundaries between the interior and the exterior, connecting users to nature. 

Andjela Karabasevic’s (AKVS) ‘Blurred Threshold’ presentation also inspired me to contemplate how thresholds, which traditionally function to connect or divide, can also become creative in-between spaces of their own. She defines a threshold as “the line crossed when entering a house” and “a point of change at which one starts to experience something”, however between the first and latter definition, in-between spaces exist, which promotes freedom and flexibility in use. Summer Houses in Montenegro are residential row housing designs AKVS has flipped inside-out, with minimal interior space and diverse exterior space, including a semi-open summer room adjacent to the entrance, a large shared front yard, and a rooftop terrace with the parapet as railing. This unconventional approach to residential design encourages more (semi) private activities to flow into the outdoors, to reconnect with nature and potentially engage in social interaction. 

Thresholds are an intangible concept, likewise the relationship between humans and nature. Architecture experiments and explores the countless potentials of both, ultimately to optimise the way we live and give back to the world we live in.