With just a few pottery classes on his resume, Tom Dixon founded one of the world’s most significant design companies. Now he wants to go back to where it all began. By CARLI PHILIPS ONE OF THE world’s most prolific designers, Tom Dixon has worked on interiors, accesso­ries, furniture and lighting since the 1980s. All…

Homeowners are getting back to nature, thanks to new trends that have architects embracing the great outdoors and landscape designers letting their gardens grow wild. BY STEPHEN CRAFTI LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTS AROUND the country are letting loose, trading box-hedged English-style gardens for a less tame, naturalistic approach that’s in keeping with Australia’s botanical vernacular. It’s part…

Meet the Melbourne motorhead whose espresso machine mods are transforming countertops the world over. BY CARLI PHILIPS A FURNITURE-MAKER BY trade and a petrolhead by passion, Dan Schonknecht is a tinkerer. With his business, Specht Design, he puts this unique set of skills to work, customising coffee machines for clients around the globe. Schonknecht admits…

Strength and sophistication combine in Rolls-Royce’s newest offering, the Black Badge Ghost. BY STEPHEN CORBY WHEN ROLLS-ROYCE ANNOUNCED the upcoming release of the Black Badge version of the Ghost, one wondered what it would entail. A mere makeover in a dark palette? Or would Rolls push the boundaries with a redesign so extreme it barely…

Secret doors, historical details and a sense of occasion…The new home cellar is a space to savour. By STEPHEN CRAFTI WINE STORAGE HAS gone the way of the home office: reimagined and enlarged to become an architectural talking point rather than a mere afterthought. Spurred by the changes wrought by Covid-19, home cellars and tasting…

Flowing from formal plantings to the farm, the revitalised ‘Darriwill’ property on the Moorabool River offers a lesson in considered design— and patience. By HELEN HAWKES IT WAS THE artist Francis Bacon who wrote that a garden is the purest of human pleasures. It’s a pleasure well known to the interior designer Sasha, whose 400-hectare…

Hyper cars have entered the electric era. Here, we take a look at five definitive plug-ins, from a mix of heritage marques and bold emerging carmakers. By STEPHEN CORBY Pininfarina Battista When we talk about how long something is we tend to measure it in football fields; if we’re making a weight comparison, we’ll reach…

How stainless-steel sports watches rose from their utilitarian roots to become the new horological flex.  ON REFLECTION, PAUL Newman must shoulder some of the blame. In 2017, the actor’s Rolex Daytona (Ref. 6239) went under the hammer at the Phillips auction house in New York. After 12 minutes of ferocious bidding, the 1968 watch was…

Sea breezes and sweeping views… These are defining features of the modern Australian home. Here, LOUIS WHITE sits down with the experts to talk about the evolution of local architecture and interior design, and what we can expect in the years to come. OWNING A HOME is the great Australian dream and when it comes…