The four Canberra homes featured in this year's Sustainable House Day

Sustainable House Day is back for 2023 and four properties in the nation’s capital are being highlighted for their impressively low environmental footprints. 

The national event, which will start on March 19 and run for a month, is championed by environmentally conscious not-for-profit Renew and looks to celebrate sustainable living – and educate the nation on its possibilities. 

This year, the four ACT homes being highlighted are The Edwin in Coombs, Magpie House in Watson, Narrabundah’s Narrabundahaus and Macquarie’s Biraban House.

The home owners, builders and architects who have been involved have opened up their projects, and their minds, to share their knowledge and experience.  

The event will feature more than 100 Australian houses, eight online sessions and a number of community partner events, including in-person tours of houses such as Biraban House.

Michael Tolhurst, architect and owner of Narrabundahaus, bought the block and its old house in 2016 with his wife after searching for a knock-down-rebuild project in the Inner North or Inner South.

“We were looking for an older home in original condition to make a knockdown rebuild viable,” he said. 

“The goal from there was to build something high-quality and resilient into the future with climate change and the like.”  

Tolhurst had long been interested in and supportive of passive housing, a design concept that creates a comfortable home with minimal heating and cooling, and it was one that he and his wife embraced when designing and building the home. 

After a long and well-thought-out design phase, the construction of Narrabundahaus began in early 2019. Tolhurst and his wife settled there in April 2021. 

Apart from the passive house considerations, the pair made many other sustainable decisions along the way.  

“The original house we demolished was one of the 1940s Canberra red-brick worker’s cottages, so we salvaged 10,000 Canberra red bricks and reused them in the new build,” Tolhurst said.

“We also made sure we installed rainwater tanks to use in the greenhouse attached to the home, and have a modest 6.6-kilowatt solar system and a battery.”  

It is estimated that households are responsible for at least one-fifth of Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions, particularly through transport, heating and cooling, appliances and waste. 

The Sustainable House Day initiative aims to cut through the overwhelming information on how to improve your environmental footprint by connecting you to those who have done just that. 

Emily Walter is the owner of Biraban House in Macquarie and is pleased to be sharing her knowledge and experience at this year’s event.

Working with Lighthouse Architecture & Science, Walter and her family set out to create what was once a badly oriented ex-government house into one that was comfortable and sustainable. 

“We bought the property in 2007 and lived in it for a least 10 years but it was quite small and it was the wrong orientation – with only one north-facing window we would all huddle around in winter,” she said. 

“We did think about extending, but the block  has a long north-facing edge and when we realised the cost of an extension, we decided to invest in something we knew we wanted.”

From there, the goal was simple, a knock-down-rebuild keeping the front garden, a cherry tree out the back, and as much yard space as possible for the kids and dogs. 

Building on a concrete slab, the family was able to create a north-facing home with an eve covering the glazing in the height of summer, but allowing the sun to hit in winter. 

All four of the ACT’s featured homes are featured on the Sustainable House Day website. The event also features a host of workshops on sustainable housing, available to book online.