“THESE spaces in our lives are so EVOCATIVE and the memories of them remain with us FOREVER.”

Ilove the image on the cover of this issue, our kitchens and bathrooms special. It is classic yet contemporary, serene and beautiful, which all makes sense when you discover that the sublime scheme was executed by the owner, architect Emili Fox. But it is also the space and its garden outlook that draws you in, and even though it is super stylish and modern, it makes me nostalgic. The kitchen in our 1970s architect-designed sandstock-brick home had Mission Brown quarry tiles and an island bench tiled in olive green. More importantly, it led onto the living room which featured a window seat with an upholstered cushion in a complementary green hue and stripy cushions. I passed countless hours of my childhood there devouring books, including a marathon session reading Charlotte’s Web right through. These spaces in our lives, whether modest or grand, are so evocative, and the memories of them remain with us subconsciously and consciously forever. I love the soothing palette in Emili’s kitchen and appreciate the well-considered seating options for sharing a meal, doing work at the dining table, perching at the island bench or lying in that gorgeous window seat reading the paper or H&G! For more kitchen and bathroom inspiration turn to page 127 for myriad ideas for creating these super-important rooms in your home.

As always, we have plenty of homes to motivate your building, renovating or decorating goals starting on page 73 with three beautiful homes built with brick as their backbone and standout aesthetic. As with any great outcome, beginning with a fabulous design delivers the best results in most cases. Some things take shape more organically, such as Theresa Albioli’s lovely garden (page 110) which boasts a luscious green-on-green palette ‘with drifts of purple and sprinklings of white’, as delicately described by our gardens editor, Elizabeth Wilson. The improvements Theresa has made have been gradual, and she has achieved an impressive result, creating a sanctuary where she looks at all of the plants as friends intermingling.

I am always impressed by talented people who own and run their own businesses and are masters of their own destiny. This issue, we talk to two such designing entrepreneurs on The Creative Type, the glamorous duo of Sonia Warner and Jacinta Woods who started their design business during the GFC when people thought they were crazy – and they are still going strong. It’s great to glean a lesson in resilience from business owners while we are all trying to sail through the uncharted waters of 2020.