Our studio doesn't design intellectually, we design from the heart and it often turns into
a sort of lyrical narrative where we actually talk about things other than architecture and
especially the Rose Bay hill, it's almost like a parody of the Opera House, where it's this
big sloping stadium. The Bridge and the Opera House are the main players in this opera and the
cities are the cast in the background. So we call it the Duet, which is these two houses singing in
harmony together and also relating to the Bridge and the Opera House, which is Sydney's icons.
I'm Bruce Stafford. I'm a surfer, snowboarder, adventurer and architect and I head up Stafford
Architecture in Rushcutters Bay and we call this project the Rose Bay Duet.
So our clients came to us in 2018. One client was the parents and the other
client was their son with his young family and the brief was obviously, in this area, is to
maximise your view, but also is to not have the two houses being the same. So
what we did in our studio is put two different teams on each house
so that they look different, but they look like they still were part of the same family.
My name is Meredith Ong, I'm the state manager of Poliform in New South Wales
and I had the privilege to represent Poliform in both of these beautiful homes.
Poliform is an international brand. It's sold through 85 countries in the world and
it's very well known and trusted. So we had two different briefs for this project. One of them
for the parents home was treated more like a second home and the other home, the son's home,
was designed to accommodate a bigger family in the future. We worked with a
great builder Seth from Blue Label Construction and everything came together in perfect harmony.
When we start a project with Poliform, we typically take our clients
and meet the team at Poliform, show them the range and they spend hours poking around,
pulling and pushing and choosing stuff and then basically Poliform meet with them and
form a design and then they come back to us and then we collaborate with them.
So it's a huge help for us architects to be working with the companies such as Poliform.
The clients appreciate a high level of detail and we're familiar with the level of quality
that we could provide. Also with the Poliform collection, it was a very holistic approach,
so we were able to cover off different areas in the home and working with
Talia the interior designer really helped us choose a variety of different finishes that
all spoke to each other, which created harmony throughout the whole house.
In working on these two large properties, we were able to really explore the Poliform offering and
for the son's home, we've introduced different timbers; special oak, walnut and black elm
and a variety of different lacquer finishes as well. We've got metal lacquer
and embossed lacquer and also different marbles that talk to each other throughout their home.
For the parents home at number 14, there is a lot of walnut and calacatta marble as well as some
travertine. the calacatta marble is a main feature of their kitchen and it's a really nice contrast
with all the natural light coming through. We were lucky enough to also provide some soft furnishings
through both of the homes. We used a variety of different fabrics and floor coverings that really
complemented all of the different spaces. So a lot of the lounges, for example, fit very nicely
into the living areas but they don't dominate the space and I think for this project working with
Poliform in such a holistic way has really enabled a consistent feel throughout both of the homes.
So my favourite part of this home is really up on the roof terrace, which we were allowed to do by
our council because the previous house had one and it really gives you like 180 degree view of the
Eastern Suburbs, from Bondi all the way to North Head and I can imagine nothing better than in
summer, sitting up there with a glass of bubbly, a few snacks and then just enjoying the view.
What I'm most proud of for this project is that we were able to explore the full
Poliform collection and provide a solution for the clients and what I
like the most is the master bedroom area. There's a real sense of openness and as you walk through,
there's Poliform wardrobes on each side, but it doesn't feel too enclosed.
The most proud thing for me is to see a happy client because what are we here for? We're
here to design homes for clients. You know, that's my benchmark. If a client's happy,
we're happy. The rest follows after that obviously with the architecture and sitting
in a space that you've all conceived is wonderful but sitting and having a whiskey
with my client is actually the high point for me.