Living for tomorrow
This is an excerpt from an article in Sanctuary magazine issue 6.
It’s a curious fact that the Gold Coast is home to some of Australia’s most innovative developments, as well as some of its most excessive.
The strip’s “knock it down and build something new” mentality has led to a unenviable suburban sprawl. Older suburbs that once boasted quaint Queenslanders now have rows of featureless brick duplexes and apartments.
But drive just a little south and inland of the glitter of Surfers Paradise and you come across a patch of land that aims to set the international benchmark for sustainable living – the Ecovillage at Currumbin.
Recently awarded the World’s Best Environmental Development in the 2008 International Real Estate Federation’s “Prix D’Excellence” Awards in Amsterdam, this lofty aim has become reality.
Sanctuary spent a few hours with the brains behind this innovative project – husband and wife team Chris Walton and Kerry Shepherd – respectively the project’s Managing Director and Marketing Manager.
The couple, along with their nine-year-old son Fin, built and live in one of the estate’s first buildings, the aptly named “Living Laboratory”, voted HIA’s 2008 Greensmart National Building of the Year.
This spunky little home is just over 100 square metres inside, with another 74 square metres for outdoor living, but its modest dimensions belie its grand aspirations. It’s a fascinating house that manages to be wonderfully liveable while maintaining an ant-sized footprint.
“When we talk to people designing their homes we ask them to think carefully about how much space they need,” Kerry explains, “as opposed to how much space they want.” The theory being that household space you don’t use is a waste of energy (to build, light, clean, heat and cool), materials and money.
Hence the un-Gold Coast-like introduction of one-bedroom allotments. One-bedders were something the Gold Coast city council was trying to phase out years ago, but Kerry points out the obvious: “A single mature woman could very comfortably live in a home with one bedroom plus a study for visitors. She doesn’t need a four bedroom house to heat and light!
“So Chris went to council,” says Kerry, “and we put forward the reasoning behind what we were thinking as part of the estate planning, and most people – even the bureaucrats – end up agreeing with us.”
In other ways, too, the ecovillage is not remotely like your average estate. There are no homes lining a street, for a start. Houses are placed in clusters backing onto a communal parkland – not unlike old fashioned London terrace homes that back onto a private park shared by residents. Fences can be built at the side and front but not at the back, giving social interaction between neighbours.
“This idea is to promote community and security. I know people who live in the suburbs and don’t see a neighbour for months on end. Here, most Sundays, you end up on someone’s veranda enjoying conversation and glass of wine.”
