We’d intended to put up regular progress reports on Andrew and Wendy’s house but, somehow, other things got in the way. So, before builder Dan Oakley of Cosmic Constructing packs up his tools and heads off for a very well-deserved break, we grabbed him for a quick chat.

‘Having those first plans knocked back forced us to look at things differently,’ says Wendy. ‘We didn’t need a big house – we’re much happier with the tight footprint and cleverness of the final design. It’s been nice to see that evolve.’

Andrew and Wendy’s house came about when the owner of a plot of land contracted Nicholls at the end of the Forties to build a place for him. It took a while for the design to be finalised, and even longer for a builder to be selected. That wasn’t the end of it.

Castlecrag, where Andrew and Wendy’s house is, is one of Sydney’s most interesting and unusual areas. For a start, it’s a planned suburb, designed expressly to foster community spirit – a concept more likely to be found in Europe and North America than Australia.

Over the next few months, we’ll be doing something a little different, by following a renovation of a 1950’s house in Sydney’s Castlecrag all the way through.

I travel overseas regularly – sometimes for work, sometimes for holiday – on all of these trips, however, I usually have an eye open for items I may be able to use on current or future jobs.

On my first trip to Morocco for the hotel, my client – a Frenchman I had met in Marrakech about 20 years earlier – took me around to lots of private houses, villas and hotels in the area, including Paul Bowles’ and Barbara Hutton’s houses. We also visited a number of artisans – tile makers, rug makers, fabric makers and metalworkers. At the end of 10 days, I told him I felt I’d done no work, but what he’d done was re-educate me into a different way of working.

A client whose apartment I’d renovated in Sydney asked me to look at an apartment she was thinking of leasing in Frankfurt. I was working in Bayreuth at the time, so went up to Frankfurt overnight, and immediately measured it up. We spent the rest of that evening back at her house drinking wine, talking about what she was hoping to achieve, and designing the space.

As a designer, I never really know what my job will be until I at least visit the site. For instance, I was sent very elaborate drawings of what appeared to be a finished building – a hotel in Tangier, Morocco.
The idea was that I’d work on the interior design and that would be it, but when I got there, it was a complete shock.