A steel-frame home, garage and stables taking shape on acreage in Ingleside. This one is still under construction, so what you see here is the build as it actually happens: from bare paddock to a home in the landscape.
The owners of this rural block first reached out through our website at the start of 2025. They had been reading our Healthy Homes newsletter, and they arrived with something we value highly: a deep knowledge of their own land, from its levels and drainage to the wildlife that shares it, and a clear idea of the home they wanted to put on it.
The brief was a single-level, steel-framed home with a garage and stables, on acreage that backs onto bushland. The block sits within a sensitive landscape, so the project runs under a biodiversity management plan and came through a full development application. Three engineered slabs, with piers taken down to rock, carry the house, garage and stables.
The owners have stayed closely involved at every step, from structural decisions through to how the home will handle heat, cold and moisture. That kind of engaged client makes a project better, and it is exactly the way we like to work.
A project this size, on land this particular, does not start with a contract. It starts with pre-construction: the working-out phase where scope, cost and responsibility get settled before anyone breaks ground. Here is what that looked like for Ingleside.
How Pre-Construction WorksBefore anything was signed, we priced the project as a full scope, as the house alone, and as the house and garage together. Seeing the real numbers side by side let the owners decide what to build now and what to stage, with their eyes open.
The project was contracted in two stages, so the scope could grow as decisions firmed up rather than forcing every call to be made on day one. Stage two expanded the works once the owners were ready.
These owners knew their land and wanted to stay hands-on with parts of the project. So we agreed, in writing and before construction, exactly who was managing what. Clarity up front is what keeps a shared project friendly.
Structural engineering, certification, septic design and earthworks were coordinated during pre-construction, including trades the owners had chosen themselves because those trades already knew the block.
Where it started: a bare paddock between the road and the bush. Everything on this page has been built from this.
The house slab poured and cured, straight off the drone: the footprint of the home visible for the first time, with the steel wall frames laid out around it, ready to stand.
The steel frame arriving on site. Steel framing gives this home straight, stable walls and stands up to whatever an exposed rural site throws at it.
The frame standing and the roofline visible for the first time. From here the shape of the home reads clearly against the bush behind it.
The Colorbond roof on and the home locked up against the weather, with the garage standing and the earthworks for the wider site taking shape behind it.
Turf down and the block starting to look like a property rather than a site. On acreage, the land around the home is as much a part of the project as the home itself.
In the shed, the stable beams take shape. Every post and beam is solid hardwood, cut, joined and finished by hand before it goes up.
Inside the house, the first finished details: a recycled brick chimney with a herringbone hearth and a slow-combustion fireplace.
The stable frame standing on its own engineered slab: a custom post-and-beam structure in solid hardwood, designed and built specifically for this property.
New photos are added as the build progresses · The finished home, coming soon
We document our projects as we build them: site walkthroughs, the details behind the walls, and the decisions that shape how a home performs. Follow along on Instagram, or join the Healthy Homes newsletter and we will bring the interesting parts to you.
Whether you are at the early thinking stage or ready to move, we are happy to have an honest conversation. No obligation. We will tell you if we are not the right fit.