While most would have baulked at the clunky layout spread across three levels of this Fitzroy North warehouse conversion, WOWOWA truly leant into the challenge. With the aim to reconfigure and nail the random geometry of a 90s fit-out, the designers embarked on an ‘otherworldly industrial meets nostalgic Woman’s Weekly cookbook cake special thematic’, according to WOWOWA director Monique Woodward. Pack your fruit roll-ups and top up the Cottee’s cordial, we’re in for a wild ride!
‘There is so much texture history to those old warehouses, this one was a shoe factory, and we were keen to embellish the rich layers that built up over time’, explains Monique. And embellish they did! Gutting almost the entire existing layout, the team reoriented the space towards the windows, and added ample storage to up the functionality of this family home, as well as layering textures, surfaces and colours to create a truly one-of-a-kind result.
On the ground level, the mottled ‘fruit tingle’ existing brickwork inspired a palette of reds, pinks, tans mustards, browns and copper in the kitchen, with candied textures and luxurious surfaces leaving the kitchen looking positively ‘lickable’. A pearlescent chocolate swirl island bench plays brilliantly off a pinky marble splashback, amped up to the max by copper kitchen cupboards.
Behind the kitchen runs an 8-metre long terracotta corridor that houses a bar, pantry, laundry and drying room that open up to a ‘wonderfully open dining and living space’ where an expansive bookshelf provides places for any number of knick-knacks, and a slab of sliding pink Marblo conceals the television. Genius!
The top layer in this decadent three-tiered cake of a house takes on equally ornate quality. The master bedroom sees plum slices peeking through the joinery that plays off rich velvet red carpet, while soft pink tiles line the master bathroom that overlooks the leafy Fitzroy North surrounds.
A renovation of this magnitude takes courage, and an enormous amount of trust from the client; something Monique and the WOWOWA team don’t take for granted. ‘We are so lucky to work with fun clients who don’t take themselves too seriously, love to put humour and narratives in their homes, and truly make it theirs’, she says, ‘…because, as we always say, life’s too short for boring spaces!’
