Permanent Vacation – Cranbrook House by CM Studio
Inspired by the idea of an immersion in a permanent state of vacation, Cranbrook House takes cues from the Mediterranean to create a casual, tranquil atmosphere. CM Studio combines a palette of muted and soft flowing elements with an open informality to design a relaxing sanctuary.
Despite its urban milieuin Sydney’s Bellevue Hill, Cranbrook House is conjured as a place of ultimate escapism. Surrounded by established independent properties that speak to a common residential vernacular, this home sets itself apart in its ambitions as a place reminiscent of a European vacation. Taking cues from time spent abroad and the familiar Mediterranean coastal aesthetic, the resulting materiality and finishes palette responds in both tonality and texture, offering a lightness and openness that welcomes a free-flowing existence between inside and out. CM Studio has combined a playful understanding of space and, through an openness of thresholds, created a home that connects deliberately between its built and natural elements.
Taking cues from time spent abroad and the familiar Mediterranean coastal aesthetic, the resulting materiality and finishes palette responds in both tonality and texture, offering a lightness and openness that welcomes a free-flowing existence between inside and out.
Built by Bau Group Construction and with considered lush landscaping by Marcia Hosking, Cranbrook House finds itself immersed within an envelope of living and breathing green elements. Housing the owner’s unique and curated collection of objects, artwork and furniture, the family home opens its louvred shutters and French-style doors to reveal a series of rooms that speak of far-away places. As a reworking exercise, the transformation of Cranbrook House into its current iteration sees minimal structural alteration and instead concentrates on the reinvigoration of the kitchen, opening up spaces and altering the finishes of surfaces.
The entertaining and living spaces are afforded the largest internal volumes, opening to outdoor rooms. The significant adjustments to the kitchen space allow the incorporation of a large walk-in scullery, allowing the front of house kitchen to double as an entertaining and gathering spaces. Throughout, neutral tones are used, and timber adds a depth and texture to each internal space, warming and connecting to the natural. Moulded plaster is used as a feature in the kitchen and each of the bathrooms, referencing the traditional crafted technique used in the Mediterranean region and offering a connection to place and to the hand made.
Cranbrook House beautifully captures the essence of the vacation home, through planning, an openness and an integrated casualness throughout. CM Studio has combined organic forms and lines with natural elements and restraint in finishes and colour, resulting in a home of relaxed, zen sensibilities.
