3 Video Views·Feb 4, 2026
Located on the north side of Bruny Island, Killora Bay is an open-air cabin surrounded by pristine bushland and wild grasses. The vibrant forest landscape envelops the home, allowing residents to connect with nature and live privately in a refined environment. The site, with its natural clearing, comes with some restrictions, including a predefined building area, which informs the scale of the cabin's off-grid structure.
The constraints presented a final challenge that ultimately became indispensable to the design of the off-grid cabin. The architecture needed to be flexible – the house's small floor plan meant that every building element had to work hard to achieve a comfortable and versatile space. This included incorporating fold-out beds to function as part of the furniture, allowing rooms to be used for different functions as needed.
The interior spaces are designed with high ceilings and glass windows to bring light and movement into the interior design. Still connected to nature, greenery outside surrounds the interior rooms, with sunlight casting ever-changing shadows inside the house. As an outdoor cabin, sliding doors allow the house to encompass the outside as if it were its own.
The house's material palette is simple, allowing the landscape to speak first. As an off-grid cabin, it was important that the materials meet fire safety regulations, but also work harmoniously with the surrounding forest landscape. Dark wood cladding contrasts with the white concrete poured inside – the concrete has a rough finish and further brings the earthy tones of the landscape indoors.
This The Local Project video is sponsored by Autodesk. Head to the link in the video description
to receive a 30-day free trial with their computer-aided design software AutoCAD.
Kelora Bay is located on the north of Borinne Island. The site itself is located on the slope
above Kelora Bay overlooking the Dantre Castel channel. The site has beautiful long tall grass
trees. We fell in love with the bush and I think for us it was always about the forest embracing
the trees and living very privately in this delicate environment. It's a very special place
it's like you leave your normal life behind and wherever you go everything is just wild and still
untouched. Because it's such a delicate environment the site came with certain restrictions. The site
came with a clearing and the clearing came with a predetermined building zone which determined
the scale of the building. With a small floor plan comes the need for flexibility and so in
the bedrooms we opted for fold-out beds so you can actually fold them up and they're part of
a joinery wall. They disappear and so the rooms can be used for different functions. I really
believe that the restrictions helped design. All the building elements are made to work hard
because of that. Often the building element has multiple functions and every inch of the floor
plan works. As you approach you get welcomed in this external courtyard which invites you in.
You are immediately greeted into this beautiful foyer. As you go around the corner you are greeted
with a more generous social space with high ceilings to give it that more generous feel.
The light in the shack is actually one of my favorite things. You wake up in the east with
the morning sun and you follow the sunshine and the shading of the trees. Those shadows are ever
changing they just keep moving which is really beautiful. We opted for frameless skylights in the
wet area. The skylights catch your eye up to the canopy above and it feels like you're having a
shower outdoor which is amazing. It's always a light place to be and I think the greenery around
it on a beautiful rainy day makes it even more intense. We opted for sliding doors in the main
living area just to embrace and open up the shack to the outdoors. On a rainy day you could even
open up the doors sit sheltered in the dining room but still feel like you're half outside.
The material palette we kept really simple. We really wanted the landscape to speak not the
architecture and so we chose materials that work well within the landscape. We really try to do as
much as we could ourselves so it goes from sourcing the timber locally to air drying it
to making sure that it was up to the bushfire regulations. The same for the concrete we really
try to do everything in one pour of concrete. The floors in the bathroom, the kitchen splashback,
the kitchen bench but also the vanities in the laundry and the bathrooms they're all poured out
white concrete that we did all in one go. The shack actually feels like it silhouettes within
the forest and so the dark stain silver top ash looked great but also served really well as bushfire
resistant cladding. We also used white concrete to counteract the darkness of the dark cladding.
The white concrete it's quite a raw finish and so it's very earthy. I think when it came to
materials we really wanted to make those subtle decisions with soft pastel colours, dark timber
tones. Everything was inspired by the landscape around it. My favourite part of the house is
definitely the feeling that when you're here you are connected with nature. To be able to
build within such a delicate landscape where it's all about the bird life and the beautiful
tall grass trees it's so special but it's also so precious. For us to be able to enjoy it like
we do is pretty incredible. This The Local Project video is sponsored by Autodesk. Their leading
program AutoCAD is a computer-aided design software that architects, engineers and construction
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on The Local Project like Kalora Bay by Tanna Architects have been built through this software
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