The next and last instalment of our Southport House reveals is here!
We’re turning our eyes to all the living spaces in the home. The rooms where the family relax, enjoy, connect and entertain – so basically the next heart of the home (after the kitchen of course). The living spaces in this large home include the family room, rumpus room, sports bar, formal living and new study nook. We’ve upgraded and improved all these important areas of the home through new joinery, details, materiality and design solutions.
So let’s walk you around these many living areas – space by space!
FAMILY ROOM
The family room is an open plan living space beside the kitchen and dining. The first priority in this space was to remove the full height wall between the family room and the hallway / rumpus to open up the views out over the back yard. The design solution we landed on was to drop the wall to half height which created a great visual connection between the spaces through to the exterior. This half height nib wall solution also alleviated the need for any modifications to the existing timber floor boards – which we wanted to avoid as they’re currently a special finish which we weren’t touching. This simple change really opened up the feeling of this space, making it feel larger, more conversational and linking the threshold out to the exterior.
A new built-in wall unit incorporating open shelves, niches, drawers and cupboards was designed to incorporate not only the TV and AV equipment but also provide a space to display artefacts and décor items. We carried the same Farmers Doors joinery profiles into this space, as well as the same white washed oak in the shelves from that in the kitchen and scullery beside. Large square set niches were added into the new wall build out below the TV to house large organic baskets for the clients extra cushions and blankets. The same Dekton benchtop product from the kitchen was carried into the bottom face of these niches for extra wear durability.
The family room joinery was designed to be an extension from the kitchen to compliment the new palette and style brought through the home.
RUMPUS ROOM
Through the reduction of the family room / hallway wall the rumpus room became more of a thoroughfare out to the backyard from the rest of the home. Due to this we removed the carpet, existing wardrobe and internal sliding door in the rumpus and added french laid travertine stone flooring to open up this room visually. The travertine stone was matched to that in the existing pool area to ensure consistency and connect this indoor space to the outdoor spaces beyond.
A new wall build out with joinery was added and designed to bleed on from that in the family room beside. The same materiality, proportions and style was mirrored here. The clients wanted this space to reflect a walk-through gallery feel while also giving them a space to showcase their large book collection, artworks and styling items.
SPORTS BAR
Within the sports room, the existing low rise wet bar was replaced with a new full wall joinery bar unit that features cathedral glass doors, 2pac joinery in Porters Paints ‘Rubble’ and whitewashed oak timber display shelving. A small sink with tap and benchtop prep space was added, as well as two beverage fridges set under bench.
The look and feel of this space formed a more unique part of the home, influenced by the 14 years the couple lived in Asia. A tropical plantation style was used as inspiration, crafting space for the artworks and artefacts collected overseas over the years. This space has a slightly warmer tone from the rest of the house to reflect this. Concealed lighting was incorporated into the shelving to highlight the keepsake items on display.
The volume of height in this space gives the room a lovely grand feel, so celebrating the existing pitched ceiling with the exposed rafters and shiplap cladding was important. A large brass and glass mobile style pendant sourced in the US was added to this, hung from the existing exposed rafters over the clients large pool table.
A small custom joinery feature was added on the opposite side of the room, designed to conceal the clients TV. Through the use of an Ultralift Titan lift up mech with swivel, the benchtop folds open and the TV rises up from its disguised location. Power points and switches were moved / increased throughout the sports bar to suit the new joinery and the clients Google Home, wireless speakers and telephone.
STUDY NOOK
The existing lockers outside of the ground level laundry were removed to repurpose this area into a study nook. The desk nook was integrated into this small area in the thoroughfare to provide a space to have a computer set up for the everyday email and bill duties. File storage, stationary drawers and plenty of open shelving with integrated LED lighting was added to complete this functional office nook. The same joinery colours, details and Dekton benchtops from the kitchen were also carried into this space. A wallpaper sourced by the client over in the US was installed behind the joinery to create texture and warmth.
A sweet little nickel wall sconce was selected, in addition to more power points below the desk area and cable outlet set into the benchtop for seamless computer and charging usage.
WINDOW COVERINGS
Another lovely addition to this renovation was a full set of new window coverings throughout. We specified a beautiful linen blend fabric from Unique Fabrics for the sheer curtains throughout the home. The ‘Snow’ colourway was utilised in the formal living room on feature chrome rods which created a nice bright look, and the ‘Pearl’ added to all the other spaces including sports bar, rumpus room, morning room and bedrooms upstairs.
In the bedrooms upstairs we added a combination of sheers + blockout curtains, and also additional romans for the smaller louvered windows. We opted for a double pinch pleat heading on all our curtains to elevate a classic more formal look.
You can find the kitchen reveal for this home here, and the full basement reveal here.
