Moonee Ponds

This Californian bungalow is similar to many in its heritage-listed streetscape. The timber home now benefits from an upper level, sympathetically designed to respond to the period’s pitched roof line and symmetrical windows, for a couple with two young children and the teenage years not far away.

The kitchen now opens to the northern rear garden, complete with a swimming pool and an alfresco dining area with a retractable roof and a built-in outdoor kitchen. Hand-blown pendant lights designed by Mark Douglass give the house a more artisan feel. The party walls framing the double-sided fireplace were removed, while the home’s traditional timber wall panels were restored, and one of them is a secret door to the bar and cellar.

The palette steers towards green, blue and aquamarine, with accents of navy in the rugs and cushions to anchor the lighter tones. What was a fairly standard 1930s bungalow is now a family home that delivered everything on the wish-list and considerably more.