Some clients arrive with a brief. Others arrive with a vision. And occasionally, someone walks through a door and sees not what a building is, but everything it was and everything it could be again.
This was one of those clients.
Craigellachie is a c1873 Italianate Victorian residence, built in two stages, classified by the National Trust and largely unchanged since Victorian days. Twenty two rooms. Ornate 15ft ceilings. Intricate tessellated tiles. Baltic pine floors. Eleven marble mantelpieces. Stained glass windows. A two level observation tower. A sprawling return verandah.
When we first walked through it, the word that kept coming back was romantic. Dilapidated, yes. In need of enormous care and attention. But romantic in the way that only a building with genuine bones and a genuine story can be. The kind of place that asks something of you.
The client understood that immediately. They came not to reinvent it but to honour it. To breathe new life into something that had been quietly waiting. The brief was glamorous and generous. A sophisticated family home with the space and warmth to entertain beautifully, and enough room that the children would never want to leave.
What made this project truly special was the team that came together around it. Flack Studio, Connect Plus, Florian Wild and Basis Builders worked tirelessly with the care and craft a building like this demands. Collaboration in the truest sense of the word, every discipline present, every voice genuinely in play.
This is what heritage work is really about. Not preservation for its own sake, but the belief that a building's story is worth continuing. That the right family, the right vision, and the right team can return something extraordinary to its former glory without dimming a single thing that made it special.
Craigellachie is magnificent. It always was.
#kisterarchitects #melbournearchitect #craigellachie #heritagerenovation
The Balnarring Beach holiday house is tucked away in Western Port Bay amongst the tea trees, built to withstand the beachfront elements with hard-wearing materials.
Architecture @b.e_architecture
Photography @tatjanaplitt
Fitzroy North Project | A well considered outdoor area makes all the difference in a home with a smaller footprint, brining the outside in and embracing nature and natural light.
Architecture @thereforestudio
Photography @arorygardiner
A contemporary extension that honours the home’s Modernist roots, blending old and new through a retained concrete facade, natural light and timber finishes to create a sustainable, nature-connected family home.
Architecture: @kister_architects
Photography: @peterbbennetts
#modernisthome #contemporaryextension #australianarchitecture #sustainabledesign #indooroutdoorliving homedesign architecturelovers melbournearchitecture naturallight modernliving
What better time to look back at some of our best pools for the Melbourne forecast ahead.
#melbournesummer #pooldesign #melbournebuilders #poolside #summer
