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A blackened stainless–steel fence surrounds the swimming pool.
Glen Iris, a suburb of Melbourne, Australia, is just 6 miles from the city center. It features neatly laid-out lots, old-growth trees, and a history that dates back to the mid-19th century. The houses range from Victorian charmers to modern takes on family living, but none is more appealing—or boldly contemporary—than a recently completed, two-level residence by Pandolfini Architects.
When the clients, a couple with three school-age children, approached the firm in 2020, they were living in the house—a century-old California-style bungalow they had bought as a teardown—that came with the ¼-acre property. While they envisioned a distinctly 21st-century replacement, they were also looking for an enduring quality that would stand the test of time. “They showed us reference images of ruins,” director Dominic Pandolfini reports, “old structures that had been around for hundreds of years but were still standing, which really struck a chord with us.” Just as intriguingly, the clients mentioned a recent rafting vacation, where they had enjoyed discovering fresh vistas around each bend in the river. They hoped to evoke the feel of an unfolding journey in their new home—another idea that resonated with Pandolfini, who set out to give their vision concrete form.
Terra-cotta bricks, sandblasted concrete, and a screen of patinated copper pipes compose the street facade of a ground-up three-pavilion house in Melbourne, Australia, by Pandolfini Architects and Lisa Buxton Interiors.
A Melbourne Home By Pandolfini Architects + Lisa Bruxton Interiors
The resulting 6,500-square-foot house comprises three pavilions aligned along a block-through axis, with the front and rear street elevations facing west and east, respectively. The first volume, a two-story structure flanked by a single-car garage, contains the entry hall and the private quarters: a family room and four bedrooms, each with an en suite bathroom. The facade is unlike anything else on the block, a striking composition of simple geometric forms defined but softened by a distinctive yet restrained materials palette: raw concrete, terra-cotta brick, and patinated copper. “We wanted it to look like a modern building,” Pandolfini notes, “but we also wanted it to sit relatively comfortably in the street.” Hence the use of terra-cotta, which tiles many Glen Iris roofs but here clads the upper story—with a twist: The vertically stacked bricks are laid at a 45-degree angle, creating light-catching striations that animate the surface. Inspired by the neighborhood’s ubiquitous garden fences, the ground floor is wrapped in a screen of copper pipes with a verdigris finish. “Eventually the metal would go green on its own,” the architect acknowledges, “but that could take decades, so we helped it along.”
The rear pavilion, a low-slung concrete-block structure with an asymmetrical corrugated-metal roofline, houses a large garage with a vehicle lift where the husband works on a collection of classic automobiles. Sandwiched between it and the bedroom pavilion is a gabled, barnlike volume reaching some 16 feet at its peak. This contains the public spaces—living and dining areas, separated by a monumental freestanding fireplace, and adjacent kitchen—which open onto a covered terrace and swimming pool via a wall of sliding glass doors. Entirely lined with spotted-gum slats, the ceiling is supported by enormous concrete arches that have been sandblasted to achieve the dimple-textured look of bush hammering, a treatment applied to the material throughout.
Spotted-gum slats clad the pitched ceiling in the kitchen, while oak is used for wall slats and cabinetry.
The pipe screen opens to reveal a custom steel-and-glass front door, beyond which a stepped corridor runs the full length of the 6,500-square-foot house.
Clean, Bold Lines Make Up This Melbourne Home
On residential projects, Pandolfini typically handles the interior design too, but in this case collaborated with Lisa Buxton, director of her eponymous studio, who influenced forms and materiality as well as selected finishes and furnishings. “Lisa really pushed us toward a richness we probably wouldn’t have managed alone,” the architect says of the first-time partnership, which has led to several more.
“The architecture had clean, bold lines,” Buxton observes, “so we focused on adding warmth and comfort. I leaned into stone, wood, and metal—authentic materials that not only look beautiful but also stand the test of time.” She was careful to mix textures, balancing smooth, sleek finishes against rougher, more tactile surfaces or juxtaposing crisply detailed masonry and millwork against soft, yielding furnishings and fabrics. Honey-toned oak, used for cabinetry throughout and as slats that cover several walls, also appears as flooring in the bedroom pavilion, while travertine tiles lie underfoot in the barn, which is anchored by the fireplace—a molded, monolithic form that, like many of the walls, is coated with polished plaster.
The breakfast nook’s built-in banquette is upholstered in leather and faced in travertine tile, which also covers the floor.
A colonnade with irregular flagstone paving runs outside the laundry, mudroom, and service areas.
Evoking A Sense Of Discovery
Furnishings are by a mix of mid-century masters, contemporary innovators, and local artisans. In the living area, Francesco Binfaré’s striking yet sinfully comfortable Standard sofa is joined by a pair of GamFratesi’s Epic cocktail tables in rust-red steel—sculptural forms inspired by Greek columns that evoke the classical world. The breakfast nook’s built-in semicircular banquette, faced in travertine and upholstered in burgundy leather, is overhung by Meaghan and Roberto Rodriguez’s O’cluster pendant fixture, a grouping of ostrich eggs that shares an archaic aura with Simone Bodmer-Turner’s cast-stoneware vessel on the custom John Bastiras table below.
And the sense of discovery that the clients had hoped for? Like a grandly scaled version of the traditional shotgun cottages found in the American South, a corridor runs straight as an arrow from the front door to the rear garage (even though “it’s bad feng shui to be able to see all the way in,” Pandolfini wryly notes). But a 7-foot drop in grade means the pathway steps down from one pavilion to the next, transitions further emphasized by pocket doors set in low portals that act almost like compression lockers between the spaces—the architectural equivalent of bends in a river through which the residence reveals itself in subtle stages.
Peek Inside This Melbourne Home
Massive sandblasted-concrete arches support the central pavilion, which contains the kitchen, living, and dining areas.
In the living area, backdropped by more sandblasted concrete, Francesco Binfaré’s Standard sofa is accompanied by GamFratesi’s round Epic cocktail tables, a sculptural Doo side table by Christophe Delcourt, and Paavo Tynell’s perky 9602 floor lamp.
A freestanding fireplace finished in polished plaster separates the living from the dining area, where Hanspeter Steiger’s Torsio chairs gather under Meaghan and Roberto Rodriguez’s O’branch pendant fixture.
A blackened stainless–steel fence surrounds the swimming pool.
Opening onto the street at the rear of the property, the third pavilion comprises a garage with a vehicle lift for the homeowner’s collection of classic cars.
On the terrace, Harrison and Nicholas Condos’s Balmain table and chairs face the outdoor extension of the nook’s banquette.
Surveyed by Wearstler’s Slab sconce, a custom oak vanity with a Sahara Sand marble top and Oko Olo’s cast-bronze door pulls complements the main bathroom’s travertine-tiled floor and walls.
Kelly Wearstler’s Senso lamp sits on Arne Vodder’s AV08 chest of drawers in a child’s bedroom, one of three.
A blackened stainless–steel handrail adorns the staircase, where treads are engineered oak, as is flooring throughout the bedroom pavilion.
PANDOLFINI ARCHITECTS: PHILIP VASILEVSKI. LISA BUXTON INTERIORS: SARA GRABALOSA. MUD OFFICE: LANDSCAPE CONSULTANT. MEYER CONSULTING: STRUCTURAL ENGINEER. DOME BUILDING PROJECTS: GENERAL CONTRACTOR.
FROM FRONT GRAZIA & CO: STOOLS (KITCHEN). VOLA: SINK FITTINGS. REDUXR: PENDANT FIXTURES (KITCHEN, NOOK, DINING AREA). STRUC: CUSTOM DOOR (ENTRY). IN GOOD COMPANY: CUSTOM ROUND TABLE (NOOK). SIMONE BODMER-TURNER: STONEWARE VESSEL. EDRA: SOFA (LIVING AREA). DELCOURT COLLECTION: SIDE TABLE. GUBI: FLOOR LAMP, COCKTAIL TABLES. CADRYS: RUG. BISAZZA: POOL TILE (POOL). HÖRMANN: SLIDING DOORS (GARAGE). RÖTHLISBERGER KOLLEKTION: CHAIRS (DINING AREA). TILES OF EZRA: FIREPLACE TILE. RH: TABLE, CHAIRS (TERRACE). GREAT DANE: DRESSER (BEDROOM). KELLY WEARSTLER: LAMP. APAISER: TUB (BATHROOM). DURAVIT: SINKS. BRODWARE: TUB FILLER, SINK FITTINGS. TIGMI TRADING: VANITY HARDWARE. THROUHOUT WOODCUT: ENGINEERED OAK FLOORING. ARCHITECTURAL HANDMADE BRICKS AND PAVERS: BRICKS, PAVERS. SIGNORINO: TRAVERTINE TILE, MARBLE COUNTERTOPS. PAINT: DULUX.