The Legacy of Robin Boyd – Pettigrew by Flack Studio

Words by Bronwyn Marshall
Photography by Derek Swalwell
Interior Design by Flack Studio

Originally conceived and built in 1943, Pettigrew House is the first home designed by Robin Boyd. Flack Studio has carefully restored and extended the home’s legacy while respectfully reconfiguring it to create a family home that will stand the test of time.

Located in leafy Kew, in Melbourne’s inner east, the home is a record of Boyd’s earliest work – a vital part of his architectural legacy and of the story of the Modernist movement within Australia. Requiring a measured and respectful approach, the reinvigoration came together as a series of restrained and deliberate gestures. Flack Studio collaborated with the clients, avid Boyd admirers, to restore and breathe new life into the home.The result sees a matched passion for home’s legacy the expressed with an ingrained appreciation for craft and the considered residential condition.

Located in leafy Kew, in Melbourne’s inner east, the home is a record of Boyd’s earliest work – a vital part of his architectural legacy and of the story of the Modernist movement within Australia.

Envisioned as the clients’ forever home, Pettigrew is a fusion of personalities.

Having remained in the original owners’ hands until only recently, the current custodians purchased the house in 2015. A well-versed understanding of Boyd’s design principles was established as the base foundation for the new work, to ensure the bequest of the home’s original intentions was extended and expanded upon. As an expression of the same honest and natural palette, the approach to materiality and its application within the many spaces is carried out within the same Modernist guiding ideologies. Wanting to avoid clients feeling that they were living within a museum, Flack Studio worked to ensure the home responds to how its owners currently live, while continuing Boyd’s design intent.

Envisioned as the clients’ forever home, Pettigrew is a fusion of personalities. Through furniture, artwork and joinery, there is an instinctiveness to the capturing of the spirit of the heritage of the home and its current residing personalities. After extensive research into magazines of the 1940s and 1950s, a framework was created to appreciate the key design elements and approach to planning. Treading a fine line between re-creation and creation itself, the approach was to re-intercept colours that existed within the space and express them further. Saturating the previous palette and using it as a launchpad, a rich intensity is layered into each of the spaces. Any material that was taken away or repaired was then replaced like-for-like, and it is this respect for history which then strengthens the sense of Boyd’s work while simultaneously updating it for contemporary habitation.

Requiring a measured and respectful approach, the reinvigoration came together as a series of restrained and deliberate gestures.

Saturating the previous palette and using it as a launchpad, a rich intensity is layered into each of the spaces.

Intertwining an expression of its current owners and the preservation of its Modernist history, Pettigrew is both deliberate and restrained. Flack Studio has brought the home back to life and ensured its legacy will endure.

After extensive research into magazines of the 1940s and 1950s, a framework was created to appreciate the key design elements and approach to planning.
Wanting to avoid the feeling of living within a museum, both the client and Flack Studio worked to ensure the home responded to how its owners currently lived within the space, while continuing the design intent.