Best Coast

On Victoria’s beautiful Bellarine Peninsula, illustrator Dougal Ramsay and his wife Nellie have created an inviting home that draws together Cape Cod chic and quirky Australiana.

- Laura Barry

Dougal and Nellie Ramsay fell in love with their Cape Cod-inspired home on Victoria’s Bellarine Peninsula the moment they laid eyes on it. Built in the early 2000s by architect Geoffrey Brown, the property had a pastel-pink interior with quirky window detailing, plus magnificent views over Swan Bay. Soon after they bought the property, in 2012, the couple set about renovating the kitchen, office, bedrooms and alfresco areas. “We could see great potential in the house, and researched this region very carefully before we purchased,” says Dougal.

Dougal and Nellie undertook most of the renovations themselves, only turning to a local cabinetmaker, Scott Smith of Scott’s Country Look Kitchens, to reconfigure the kitchen. They installed a new Aga stove and removed an internal wall to make way for a walk-in pantry. Integrated appliances were high on the wish list, so new cabinetry was designed to accommodate the fridge, dishwasher and bin storage too. An existing bedroom was repurposed as a library, and a new deck wraps around two sides of the house, connected by floor-to-ceiling glass doors for seamless indoor-outdoor flow.

On the ground floor are a large combined kitchen and living area, laundry, bathroom, two bedrooms, and a connected rear passageway that leads to the cellar on the lower-ground floor.