Milsons Point Residence

Perched high on the prestigious Alfred Street of Sydney’s Milsons Point suburb was a neglected, tired and unimpressive apartment boasting harbour views, Sydney city views and centred in one of the most amazing places in the world. Our client, Andrew, a 64 year old widower, bought this apartment and engaged Mi Designer Styling to assist in putting his own unique stamp on it right away. Andrew saw the potential in his bachelor pad and was prepared to invest in creating something bold, daring and unique.

In particular, the kitchen of this apartment required complete overhaul. Mi Designer Styling had a few things to consider for this client. Firstly, Andrew made it very clear this is where he would be living for the remainder of his years. The functionality of the kitchen needed to be easy. Secondly, Andrew had a love for materials that had a uniqueness, a history and made by nature. These needed to be incorporated into the kitchen design.

Considering the floor plan of the apartment, the galley layout was the most functional use of space. This also allowed for ease of flow from one room to the other. We incorporated a range of Hafele and Blum hardware in this kitchen to ensure the functionality was at its best. The pantry is complete with easy glide drawers so that all items can be accessed effortlessly, there are gas lift struts in the overhead cabinets, the dish drawer is at a comfortable height and is seamlessly integrated into the cabinetry alongside the integrated waste bins. Our client is deaf and wore hearing aids – so all our appliances needed to have a visual element that showed if they were on or off. He needed lights to indicate if the dishwasher had finished its cycle or the kettle boiled. It was test to us to ensure that we incorporated the sense of “sight” into this design as “sound” was not possible.

Andrew radiated with delight and excitement when we suggested a masculine look for this kitchen. The shaker cabinetry is polyurethane sprayed in a dark and daring black which is exactly the uniqueness he was after. Our client had a love for timber so we thought what better way to bring in that beautiful timber texture and smell through the use of bench tops. We selected Himalayan Cedar bench tops due to its colour and grain. The kitchen splash back was tiled in a handmade white subway tile that has a unique texture and allows light to bounce off it in different ways, with a striking row of feature tiles. The feature tiles selected are handmade in Byron Bay by ‘Heartbeat Designs’. Our art collecting client stumbled across these whilst travelling and immediately knew he had to have them in his home. The floor tile selected is a simple concrete look porcelain tile that really sets off the black cabinetry.

The kitchen was finished off with contemporary fittings and fixtures such as the black D handles from ‘Handle House’, the chrome pull out sink mixer, sleek glass cooktop and recirculating range hood that hides away in the cabinetry. An extra level of character was incorporated through the house of a large farmhouse sink.

In addition to this, Andrew was passionate about the Japanese way of life. We custom designed doors throughout the apartment in Japanese Shoji style. This was hung through the use of black barn style hardware that connects back to the colour of the kitchen cabinetry.
The kitchen leads onto a custom designed meditation room with heated floors continuing the cement look tile.

This kitchen was even better than what he imagined and the implementation was exceeded beyond his expectations. This kitchen is bold, daring and unique whilst still completely functional to his needs.

Unfortunately, Andrew unexpectedly passed away due to health reasons in early 2018. He absolutely loved his dark and daring galley kitchen and he was able to enjoy it in his remaining days. In times of reflection, we realise this is why we are designers. We gave him a space that reflected his life.
Andrews family heritage religion was Jewish, his life philosophy was more Buddhist his design style is Japanese – he was a lobbyist supporting and pioneering refugee issues. He was just starting to date again and was really coming into his ideal life…..we miss him….a lot.