Miele
On Queensland’s Gold Coast, Vespa by Habitat Studio Architects features a suite of sleek Miele appliances that form the perfect complement to the home’s minimalist industrial edge.
Dubbed Vespa, this canal-side home in Surfers Paradise tells a visual story of its owners’ journey from the fast pace of Sydney to a more laidback lifestyle amid a subtropical sanctuary. Wayne Greenland, principal architect and director of Habitat Studio Architects, explains that the clients requested a design with industrial edge, an idea he expressed through the use of concrete – including polished concrete on the floors and brutalist-style, sheet-formed concrete on the facade – and bold black accents. As one moves through the house, this gritty urban palette is softened to suit the barefoot beach-luxe context: the rear of the home opens up to myriad glazing, a softer palette of warm timber, a seamless flow to the outdoors, and a cooling fringe of lush greenery spilling over the roofline.
This artful collision of industrial design and subtropical softness is most clearly seen in the kitchen, where black Laminex cabinetry with a subtle timber grain and a slim grey ceramic benchtop is sandwiched between the warm timber of the ceiling and floor. The raised floor level essentially places the kitchen on a platform, giving the space an elevated position to match its gravitational pull within the home. In this centrepiece space, Miele appliances beautifully capture the home’s combination of high functionality and sleek modern industrial design.
Visual effect was a key driver in the selection of Miele products for the home, Greenland explains. “Vespa has such a minimalist, industrial-style interior, so having appliances that receded into the joinery was vital,” he says. “The appliances are minimalist in nature and complement the refined material palette of the kitchen.” Integrated products, including dual refrigerators and an AutoDos fully integrated dishwasher, sit behind the black joinery, alongside sleek Obsidian Black ovens.
“The kitchen and scullery seamlessly integrate and we needed to find products that would offer complementary operation of the space.”
While aesthetics were important, functionality was always a guiding principle of the design. “One of the home’s key aspects is functionality, so the appliances had to not only fit the aesthetic but the practicalities, too. The kitchen and scullery seamlessly integrate and we needed to find products that would offer complementary operation of the space.”
This is a family home with teenage children, which meant doubling down on the fridge space with two Miele integrated refrigerators. “The requirements of any young family usually entail having a larger fridge and freezer space,” says Greenland. “The pair allows the clients to have access to everything they need on a daily basis. And, of course, the integration allows the joinery to flow through the area.”
“When you have families that like to entertain and host, dual ovens allow catering for bigger crowds and for daily use.”
The combination of hungry teens and frequent guests puts equal pressure on the cooking appliances, which inspired the selection of two built-in pyrolytic ovens. “We find a 900-millimetre oven provides too much cooking space for the average daily operation. When you have families that like to entertain and host, dual ovens allow catering for bigger crowds and for daily use.”
The cooking suite is rounded out by a Miele full-surface induction cooktop, which Greenland says was chosen over gas partly for environmental reasons – renewable resources being the practice’s preference – but also for the minimalist effect of the black DiamondFinish surface. The cooktop sits flush and almost invisibly into the back bench, letting the stone-look Vasari ceramic surface shine.
Within Vespa, hard-working Miele appliances underpin the design, meeting the functional demands of the kitchen without compromising its visual subtlety and allowing the eye to slide over the space and register only calm.
