Double Take

In Perth, the concept of yin and yang is taken to a fascinating new level by its designer owners.

You could say it’s not typical for a house to have its own name, let alone two of them. But the artfully reborn inner-city Perth home of award-winning building designer Kerry Jacobs and her interior-architect husband Simon is anything but run of the mill. “We call it the ‘Veiled House’ because of the aluminium ‘veil’ that wraps around the upper floor,” says Kerry, who with Simon heads boutique building and interior design practice, JUO. “But almost everyone in the neighbourhood seems to know our dog, Poppy, by name, so they just call it ‘Poppy’s House’.”

Both names have meaning and are reflective of the somewhat yin and yang nature of the house – the new and the old, the small and the big. “The house has something of a split personality to its structure, so its two different names are indicative of its design and soul,” Kerry says.

Also true is that what was once a severely dilapidated circa-1908 worker’s cottage sitting on a compact 316-square-metre plot of

land has been transformed by Kerry into a stylish and spacious home for her young family.

“The cottage had been deemed uninhabitable when we bought it,” she says. “It was in terribly poor condition, without proper wiring. But we loved the location and the fact that the home had views of the CBD. The cottage is triple-brick and therefore incredibly solid. And I’ve always been really interested in heritage structures from an environmental, as well as a character and soul, point of view.”

Transformed over two stages, with the family living in the original wing during the construction of the two-level extension, this is a home brimming with purposeful features. Above all, it’s a house that Kerry and Simon – who are expecting another child in December – relish sharing with their six-year-old daughter Ella, two-year-old son Harrison, and, of course, Poppy the West Highland terrier.

“It was almost like Simon was the client with this project,” says Kerry. “He was adamant that the finished product wouldn’t look

cold and architectural. He wanted all of the spaces to feel homely and function very well.”

Sympathetically renovated to accommodate the couple’s main bedroom suite and home office, as well as a family bathroom and powder room, the restored cottage is dramatically linked to the striking new wing. Enveloped by a leafy courtyard, the addition houses the open-plan kitchen and living space and, on the upper level, a roomy children’s wing.

“The extension is contrasting but complementary to the original cottage in terms of the material and colour tones,” says Kerry. “Our approach has always been that if you want to architecturally respect what something is representing, then you shouldn’t try to mimic it. I do feel that the stories that come with these historic buildings are not something that you can try to recreate.”

Delightfully, too, surprises present at every turn. There’s the glazed walkway providing a light-drenched junction between old and new, as well as the drama of the newly exposed original red-brick wall – once the plastered rear exterior of the cottage – in the bright and breezy communal domain. Not to mention the rather remarkable garage structure, complete with a floor-toceiling glass door and a roof garden designed by Gavin Hicks of Hicks Horticulture, that doubles as a ‘display cabinet’ for Simon’s cherished vintage Mercedes.