Seventeen distinguished residential projects received either an award or a commendation, out of a total of 46 recognised architecture projects at the 2025 National Architecture Awards.
Among the top honours, Hedge and Arbour House by Studio Bright in Melbourne was awarded the prestigious Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture - Houses (New), while Niwa House by John Ellway in Brisbane received the acclaimed Eleanor Cullis-Hill Award for Residential Architecture - Houses (Alterations and Additions).
New Castle by Anthony St John Parsons was the only residential project to receive more than one award, winning both the National Award for Interior Architecture and the National Award for Residential Architecture - Houses (New).
Jury chair and immediate past national president of the Institute Jane Cassidy commented that the celebrated projects demonstrate a transition "to sustainable low-operational and embodied carbon; to passive-first, all-electric principles; to local and ethical sourcing; to caring for Country; to regenerative practice and embedded biodiversity, social inclusion and connectedness; to waste minimisation and adaptive reuse and recycling; and away from the excesses of the past."
"The projects we encountered this year are more than structures: they are systems of care, of connection, of transformation," she said. "This year we have seen a body of work that is unafraid to ask difficult questions - about equity, climate and care."
Alongside Cassidy, the 2025 jury comprised Ninotschka Titchkosky, architectural innovator; Yang Yang Lee, architect at Lee Yang Yang Architect; Martyn Hook, professor at RMIT University and founding director at Iredale Pedersen Hook Architects; and Kavita Gonsalves, associate principal and sustainability design lead Asia-Pacific at Populous. You can read the jury chair's overview here.
The residential winners are:
Babylon House - Casey Brown Architecture
New Castle - Anthony St John Parsons
Hedge and Arbour House - Studio Bright
Lagoon House - Peter Stutchbury Architecture
Mapleton House - Atelier Chen Hung
New Castle - Anthony St John Parsons
Henville Street House - Philip Stejskal Architecture
Niwa House - John Ellway
Gunn Ridge House - Kennedy Nolan
The Stopover - Taylor Buchtmann Architecture
Carlton Cottage - Lovell Burton Architecture
Cloaked House - Trias
Shadow House - Grotto Studio
Blok Three Sisters - Blok Modular in collaboration with Vokes and Peters
Indi Sydney - Bates Smart
Shiel Street North Melbourne, Community Housing Project - Clare Cousins Architects
Sirius Redevelopment - BVN
