Creating Cohesion — Desert Silver Marble by Signorino
For his own home in Melbourne’s Brighton, architect Martin Friedrich opted for Signorino’s Desert Silver marble, which unifies all the residence’s elements, creating a cohesive, harmonious whole.
Grounded in an understated, minimalist aesthetic, the Brighton family home of Martin and Claire Friedrich of Martin Friedrich Architects draws on materiality and texture to create a space that feels modern and refined. Key to the design is Signorino’s Desert Silver marble, which features in nearly every room. It was an easy choice for Martin and Claire, who’s had a long-standing relationship with Signorino and has collaborated with the company on numerous projects. “As long-term specifiers of Signorino’s products, they were our first choice when it came to selecting stone for our own personal project,” he says.
Nurturing relationships with Australia’s best architects and designers is fundamental to Signorino, which has been servicing the A&D community for more than 50 years, providing premium, ethical and environmentally conscious stone and tiles. Like the Desert Silver marble, which has a neutral grey palette with web-like spatterings of white and subtle rose veining. Hints of rust also add to its distinct nature and evoke a raw, rustic feel. It has a unique quality, meaning that no two pieces will ever be the same, and it has been masterfully treated to achieve finishes including honed, polished, brushed and leathered.
It adds a subtle elevation to Martin’s Brighton family home. “We fell in love with Desert Silver right away and it became the backbone to all the other finishes,” he says. The material imbues a contemporary and luxe feeling throughout, complemented by muted and neutral tones, light timber flooring and white walls. Furnishings are similarly refined, dominated by black and charcoal tones and kept minimal so that the high-quality natural finishes are the focus.
The marble is intricate without being overpowering, and its neutral quality blends into the home’s distinctly minimalist aesthetic. That neutrality allowed it to be used in almost every room. “The marble became the backbone of the building, leading from the internal atrium bench, becoming the base for kitchen cabinetry, the hearth of the fireplace and the ledge that the BBQ sits on outside,” Martin says. “It connects all these spaces.”
Desert Silver, like all of Signorino’s high-end stones, was sourced from the globe’s best quarries thanks to the long-standing relationships Signorino has made with suppliers. It can be viewed in the company’s showrooms in Adelaide, Brisbane and Sydney, and in its large slab format at the Signorino Stone Gallery in Altona North, Melbourne, one of the largest stone galleries in the world.
