Uniting the Familiar and the Eclectic – Lindfield House by Polly Harbison Design and Arent&Pyke

As a passionate expression of a love of art, colour and the landscaped world, Lindfield House embodies a boldness and saturation of its comprising elements. Polly Harbison Design and Arent&Pyke propose a unique home of the familiar and eclectic, adding personality and uniqueness through a play on scale.

An extension to an existing home, Lindfield House is situated in Castlecrag and centres around the outward embracing of its owner’s great love, their garden. Immersed within a lushly landscaped setting, the home brings in some of the rich and textural qualities of the established garden and reinterprets them internally. The resulting series of spaces both capture the unique and richly layered personalities of its owners while carefully curating apertures outward that become picture-frame forms of the surrounding natural elements. A combined effort with architecture by Polly Harbison Design and interior design and styling by Arent&Pyke, a comprehensive approach brings materiality and texture to add depth to a rationalised and calming structure, while ensuring a sense of contemporary and enduring relevance.

Built by Zandt Building, together with engineering by Tihanyi Consulting Engineers, Lindfield House also embodies the owners’ love of art and colour, which is expressed and evident throughout. The scale of the home and its comprising zones are deliberately at play, with gestures of compression and release creating concentrated areas of focus and open, connected spaces to gather – the culmination of which is at the rear garden, where thresholds take on the role of a portal. The oversized glazed openings invite the outside in, and the positioning of seating aligned to take in the garden views.

Immersed within a lushly landscaped setting, the home brings in some of the rich and textural qualities of the established garden and reinterprets them internally.

Key to the introduction of new elements was the retention of a sense of identity for each both the existing and the newly introduced. Both the old and the new are celebrated in their own way, as is each space with its own unique nuances as their own destinations, while all is woven together subtly. As a forever space, the home needed to accommodate a multi-layered brief of multigenerational considerations, while still ensuring everything felt considered as a whole. The new kitchen and living spaces become a focus, connecting outward and making the most of orientations to capture passive heating, cooling and natural illumination throughout the year.

Polly Harbison Design and Arent&Pyke harmoniously bring together the old and new, with a bold and refreshing outlook to create a home uniquely identifiable and distinct for their clients.

Lindfield House is the result of a close and collaborative practice. Polly Harbison Design and Arent&Pyke harmoniously bring together the old and new, with a bold and refreshing outlook to create a home uniquely identifiable and distinct for their clients.