ITS OWN TALE

Stories of people and place have informed the warm approach the owners of this home in country Victoria took to their renovation.

- Yvette Caprioglio

A Melbourne couple knew from the moment they drove through the gates of this property, and beneath its stately 100-yearold cypress trees, that there was great potential in what lay before them. The secluded 1880s cottage Donna and Darren had set out to see might have been badly rundown, but it was nestled among towering bald hills and offered a beautiful, expansive outlook.

Bought in 1999, the house – located in the Central Highlands of Victoria, on the traditional lands of the Dja Dja Wurrung peoples – was surrounded by a smattering of characterful outbuildings but had sat vacant for 10 years. There were holes in the floorboards, where the clawfoot bath had fallen through rotting floorboards, no plasterwork or insulation, and the occasional nest of tiger snakes. It presented the couple with quite a challenge – and they knew from that point on it would be an ongoing project.

“The reason we moved to the country was to raise the kids in a rural community,” says Donna, who’d spent a lot of time in her childhood with extended family who lived in the region. “That sense of community was missing in the city for us. I’ve always had a strong connection to the country; for me it was important to get out of the city and reconnect.”

With a family that would grow to seven members, the couple set out to create what was first and foremost a comfortable family home: a place where everyone could be together yet also have their own space. The garden was approached similarly, with spots created to sit and gather or to quietly solve a problem under a tree. “Overall, our vision was to create a world that was ours,” says Darren.