GREAT REPAIR

Goodbye jumble of rooms, hello beautifully designed layout that works a treat for one happy Melbourne family.

- Stephen Crafti

The right location was of the essence when Sarah and Martin were house hunting, so they were open to buying a fixer-upper if it helped them land a prime site that was within budget. 

“We wanted a house that was liveable for a few years, but something we could renovate to make it ours,” says Sarah. The home they bought very much fit that bill: a villa built in the 1950s and last renovated in the 1990s. Although the couple loved the quirkiness of the three-bedroom property, it was clearly suffering something of an identity crisis, says interior designer Beatrix Rowe.

Its biggest issue was the disjointed floor plan, with odd-sized rooms and superfluous doors. “Sometimes it was quicker to walk outside to get to another room than to go through the house,” says Sarah. The poky little kitchen was a particular disappointment for Martin, who is a professional chef, and a lack of dedicated office space was a problem for Sarah, who regularly works from home.

Beatrix and the owners developed a plan to address the flaws in the layout, then rebuild the home’s character finishings using a layered, natural palette. “Sarah loves scouring auction houses for pieces that have an unusual history, so the look of the interior was led by a desire to create rooms that would showcase her special finds,” says Beatrix.