Glass blocks beat the planners: Olaver's Laneway Studio in Melbourne

By Elena Vasquez

A facade of glass blocks set in recycled white brick, held above a concrete band beam, tops the two-storey Laneway Studio that Australian practice Olaver has built in the garden of a Melbourne family home. The glass blocks weren't an aesthetic whim — they bypass planning restrictions on conventional windows.

Olaver designed the building for a family of five who were rapidly outgrowing their house. The studio offers a practical alternative to renovating the existing home.

The upper floor holds a study-cum-guest-room with an en-suite and a small roof terrace. The open-plan ground floor below conceals laundry facilities and a bar within oak cabinetry.

What does the studio replace?

The block sits behind the main house and a newly configured garden, designed by landscape architect Penny Starr to include a pool and areas of planted foliage. Large glass-panelled sliding doors lead from both the house and the studio into the garden, linking interior and exterior living space.

A second sliding door on the opposing wall — oak inside, steel-clad outside — connects the studio to the laneway that gives the project its name.

"With large sliding doors on opposing walls, the ground floor can open right through, so it works as an extension of the garden and pool terrace to the laneway rather than a closed room," Olaver director Emlyn Olaver told Dezeen.

"Open, the space feels far bigger than its footprint, and the family can spread across the house, the pool and the studio as one connected space when entertaining," she continued.

How does one room do three jobs?

The mechanism is joinery. Neutral terrazzo runs across the ground floor, and oak cabinetry conceals storage, the laundry and a TV nook while framing a central bar with a stainless-steel sink and surround.

"We wanted the studio to be calm, with joinery doing the heavy lifting so each space can change roles without feeling cluttered," Olaver explained.

"Every space had to do more than one job; a laundry, a living room or a bar depending on the day. That flexibility also gives the building a longer life, because the family's needs will keep changing as the kids grow up, move out and come back."

Why glass blocks instead of windows?

The first floor's east-facing wall overlooks the garden, and the glass-block facade above the concrete band beam brings in soft morning light while keeping the interior private. Olaver said the studio was designed to appear as a "beautiful object" that reflects light into the garden by day and becomes a "glowing lantern" at night.

Upstairs, red wraparound tiling in the bathroom is echoed by red panelling in the foldable bed's nook, itself hidden behind more oak joinery when not in use.

"The new studio's interiors echo the existing home's rich but calm textures," Olaver said. "Natural materials and tactile elements exist in both spaces, but the studio is slightly more playful in its approach."

A different answer to the Melbourne extension

Olaver frames the project as a push against local convention. "In Melbourne, the usual answer is yet another extension that eats into the backyard," she said. "Laneway Studio goes the other way, keeping the garden at the centre of the site and showing how a well-designed studio can add flexibility and density to an existing lot."

For a family whose needs will shift as children grow up and leave, the bet is that a flexible outbuilding outlives any single-purpose renovation.