Home for buyer with ideas set in concrete
This Kapiti beach house with space-age sensibilities would surely draw curious onlookers from far and wide, if only it were to hold an open home.
Looking like a set from a 1970s space drama, the Peka Peka house has been put on the market by its creators Helen and Fritz Eisenhofer, who live next door.
Austrian architect Fritz Eisenhofer came to New Zealand in the 1950s to help design state houses in Titahi Bay and stayed to set up a practice in Wellington.
Known for his modernist style, he built the 476 square metre, three-bedroom house with the help of a builder six years ago.
He did so partly to ensure the house next door was sympathetic with his own, and for family reasons.
‘‘We built it thinking our son might come back to New Zealand but no, he definitely is not,’’ he said.
Being close to the beach, the couple have been using it as a holiday house.
But even though Eisenhofer can still get up on the roof, he is now in his 90s and concedes the maintenance is now getting too much.
Eisenhofer’s work has been celebrated often, most famously in a 1967 Rita Angus rendering of Suzy’s Coffee Lounge in Wellington.
His own house, a onebedroom earth-covered dome, was featured just last month on popular BBC show George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces.
The house for sale was more conventional, he said, with just one dome and a wing on either side.
He liked domes because they created open spaces without the need for supports, and also because they blended in with the shape of the nearby sand dunes.
Both houses feature indoor pools with tropical plants, heated by solar power.
‘‘I always have three priorities,’’ he said. ‘‘The main thing is the sun; wherever possible to [capture] the sun to get the solar gain there in the wintertime.’’
‘‘The second is the view, of course, and the third is privacy.’’
Eisenhofer believes in keeping the outside simple, and he is fond of concrete.
The house is being marketed by Sotheby’s International. Agent Anthony Morsinkhof said the couple were hoping to negotiate upwards of $2 million for the property.
‘‘It’s totally his style, it’s very special.’’