Eaves and orientation: the free comfort upgrade
How you face the house on the block, and how far the eaves overhang, quietly decide how comfortable your home is before you add a single appliance.
Two of the most powerful choices in a comfortable home are the ones nobody photographs: which way the house faces, and how far the roof overhangs the windows. Get orientation and eaves right and the home stays cooler in a Mildura or Adelaide summer and warmer in a Ballarat winter, largely on its own. Get them wrong and you spend the next twenty years fighting it with heating and cooling. Best of all, these are design decisions, so they cost you thought rather than upgrades, which is why they matter so much for your 7-star rating.
Why orientation is the first move
Orientation simply means which way the home faces on the block, and in the southern states the gold standard is to point your main living areas and their windows toward the north. North-facing glass catches the low winter sun that warms the room for free, while the high summer sun stays up overhead where it is easy to shade. West-facing glass is the one to be careful with, because it cops the harsh late afternoon sun in summer that heats a room fast. On a free-ish block you design around this. On a tight infill lot in Adelaide or inner Melbourne you work with what the block allows, which is exactly why it needs thinking about early.
What eaves actually do
Eaves are the part of the roof that overhangs the walls and windows. A well-sized eave is a clever piece of passive design: it is angled to block the high summer sun from hitting the glass, while still letting the lower winter sun slip underneath and into the room. That single detail keeps north-facing rooms cool in summer and warm in winter without a blind or a switch. Homes with skimpy eaves, or none at all, lose that protection and lean much harder on curtains, tinting and air conditioning.
How they lift your energy rating
Because orientation and eaves manage the sun before it ever becomes a heating or cooling problem, they do a lot of the heavy lifting toward the 7-star NatHERS standard, and they are the cheapest way to get there. This is why an early NatHERS assessment is so useful. More often than not, nudging the orientation, adding a sensible eave or moving a window does more for your rating than paying to upgrade the glazing across the whole house.
Pairing them with shading and glass
Eaves do their best on north-facing glass. For west and east windows, where the sun comes in low and an eave cannot block it, you combine them with other shading like external blinds, a verandah, planting or the right glass. Think of it as a layered approach: orientation sets the home up, eaves handle the north, and targeted shading mops up the tricky western sun.
Getting orientation and eaves right
- Keeps summer sun out and lets winter sun in
- Does most of the work toward a 7-star rating
- Reduces how hard heating and cooling must work
- A design choice, not an extra you bolt on later
- Makes living areas brighter and more pleasant
- Harder to retrofit once the home is built
- A tight or awkward block can limit your options
- Needs to be planned at the design stage, not later
If you only fuss over one thing at design stage, make it orientation and eaves, because they are the closest thing to free comfort a home has. Face your living areas and their glass north, size the eaves to shade the summer sun and welcome the winter sun, and protect west-facing windows with extra shading. An early NatHERS assessment confirms it is working before you spend a cent on glazing.
Still weighing it up?
Tell us about your block and what you want, and we will match you with three builders across SA or Victoria who do this sort of work well.
Match me with 3 buildersCommon questions
Why does house orientation matter so much?
Orientation decides how much sun hits your living areas through the year. Facing them north catches warming winter sun and keeps out high summer sun, so the home stays comfortable with far less heating and cooling. West-facing glass is the one to shade carefully.
What do eaves do for a house?
Eaves are the roof overhang above the walls and windows. Sized well, they block the high summer sun from hitting north-facing glass while still letting the lower winter sun in, which keeps rooms cooler in summer and warmer in winter without lifting a finger.
Do eaves and orientation help my energy rating?
A lot. Because they manage the sun before it becomes a heating or cooling load, they do much of the work toward a 7-star NatHERS rating, and they are the cheapest way to get there. An early assessment shows how much they are contributing.
Can I fix poor orientation after the house is built?
Only partly. You can add external blinds, shading, planting or better glass, but you cannot change which way the home faces or where the main windows sit. That is why orientation and eaves need to be planned at the design stage.