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In every friendship group, there’s usually one person that is the designated host — the one who’s place you go to for the after party, Christmas catch ups, and long lunches.
The owners of this renovated Melbourne home by Sibling Architecture are exactly those kinds of people.
‘The couple are very social and often invite people into their home for gatherings like a casual midweek dinner to larger long lunches on the weekend,’ Sibling Architecture director Nicholas Braun says of the clients.
But before the renovation, the compact Federation house wasn’t a great match for their entertainer lifestyle, limited by the typical compartmentalised floor plan and dark rooms.
‘The vision for the design was to really play off this idea of [creating] space for gatherings,’ Nicholas adds. ‘The site and budget were both modest, so we needed to pack a punch with the design.’
The front facade, corridor entry and two front bedrooms were retained, keeping the heritage aspect of the house intact. From there, the rest of the house was rebuilt, reimagining the central living spaces as a ‘canvas’ where the theatre of everyday life could unfold.
For the clients, this meant an expansive kitchen — where bold green joinery meets custom-painted tiles by artist Angus Gardner in the splashback — a banquette seat with plenty of dining room for sharing meals, and even a dedicated ‘DJ station’.
The rear facade is made up of cream bricks and a strip if glass blocks stretching along the ground-floor living space upstairs to the bedroom, and again in the bathroom.
Skylights and carefully cut voids also helps fill the rooms with beautiful, dappled light, while an eye-catching apricot hue adds flair to functional details like open shelving, or the timber and metal staircase.
‘In most projects, it can require a bit of client encouragement to use colour,’ Nicholas says, noting colour is a signature piece of most Sibling Architecture projects.
‘However, in this case, the clients’ fun and outgoing personalities ensured that colour, texture and light were central to the design language, and this really comes through in the end result.’
The best part is how the renovation accounts for ‘overlapping’ uses. By keeping the main zone of the 120-square-metre house open and directly connected to the rear deck and garden, the space can easily transform depending on the time of day, or day of the week.
Dubbed A House To Gather, the refreshed house can now live up to its playful name!
