A 2-level apartment over a café in a Melbourne shopping strip for an always-out couple adapting to twin girls in their life. The idea was to bring their friends to them and for the girls to live in an urban playground; a festive form of nesting.

The client is a developer, builder, and plumber, building his own home as part of the development, so the apartment was conceived as a constructed interior. Interior space & furnishings have been deliberately integrated using exterior building materials to bring their urban playground inside.

If the overall effect is slightly 70's, this is perhaps due to the crafted, earthy and sybaritic nature of the spaces and materials rather than any overt references, though the conversation pit is a bit of a giveaway.

The mixed-use development replaced an existing shop: the ground floor café with inbuilt concrete and timber furniture, a first-floor single-level apartment to sell, and the resort penthouse apartment at the top.

Photography: Emma Cross, Urban Angles, and Jane McDougall