Home for buyer with ideas set in concrete

Looking like a set from a 1970s space drama, a 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.

‘‘We built it thinking our son might come back to New Zealand but no, he definitely is not,’’ he said.

The couple have been using it as a holiday house because it is close to the beach.

Though Eisenhofer can still get up on the roof, he was now in his 90s and conceded the maintenance was 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 one-bedroom 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 solarpowered indoor pools with tropical plants.

‘‘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 believed in keeping the outside simple, and he was 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.