Clad Pad is a sun-filled, family-friendly renovation to an existing dwelling located in Caulfield North. The original double-fronted, single-storey, weatherboard house was built in the 1890s in the Victorian style. The 1970s were not a kind decade and the house was transformed from an elegant Victorian cottage into the ugly duckling of the street.

Undaunted by a challenge, our clients purchased this ugly duckling with ambitions to transform the original rooms back into their former Victorian-era glory and add new contemporary light-filled spaces at the rear.

Our intervention retains original bedrooms, adding new services and a multifunctional living room that re-orientates the house to be north facing and opens onto a generous back garden. The roof form of the extension takes the existing double hip roof form of the original house, rotates it 90 degrees, and carves it out to create a distinct sculptural profile; the negative of the existing roof form as a folded ‘zig-zag’ that gathers the new kitchen, dining and living space under it.

Clad Pad celebrates the best aspects of contemporary living whilst restoring the heritage charm of what once was the ugly duckling of the street.