Home Beautiful

Timeless beauty This Queensland­er is given a new lease of life

A QUEENSLAND COUPLE SAW A BRIGHT FUTURE FOR THEIR GROWING FAMILY IN A HOME RIPE FOR A NEW CHAPTER

- STORY & STYLING TAMARA SIMONEAU PHOTOGRAPH­Y ANASTASIA KARIOFYLLI­DIS

EASY ELEGANCE Interior designer Angela and her husband, Bronte, had their eye on this beautiful Queensland­er in Toowoomba long before it was theirs. “We always loved the home and admired it,” says Angela. “We saw a lot of potential to bring it back to its former glory.” The couple bought the house when their eldest child, Ruby, now 13, was just a baby, and their renovation plans have evolved along with their family, which now includes Harriet, 11, and Hugo, eight. Classic kerb appeal comes courtesy of a bright white exterior in Dulux Lexicon with bold Dulux Monument trims, bordered by layers of linear Japanese box, murraya hedges and camellias.

Breezing through the wide, sun-soaked hallways and fresh white rooms in Angela and Bronte’s home in Queensland’s Toowoomba, it’s hard to imagine it was ever anything but the elegantly relaxed family abode it is today. For Angela, an interior designer with a passion for beautiful textiles, the memories of what came before are still vivid. “Carpets were bright blue and had been eaten by moths, the bedrooms had a different colour for every wall, and there were burgundy velvet drapes and blue doors with gold paint detail throughout,” she recalls. But none of this was enough to deter the couple from a home that had bewitched them from afar for several years. “We could see our family growing here,” says Angela, who at the time had baby Ruby. “When I saw the ‘For Sale’ sign I just had to have a look inside. I rang Bronte, who was on the roof of our home at the time doing repairs, and asked him to come and have a look, too. The next morning we both woke up knowing we had to have it.” The family moved in, and one child became three with the arrival of Harriet, now 11, and eight-year-old Hugo. As they grew, so too did Angela and Bronte’s dream floor plan. “We changed our plans three times over the years before we finally got it the way we wanted,” says Angela. The couple tasked local company, Aspect, with drawing up their much-pondered ideas and gave builder Tim van Tricht the job of meticulous­ly realising their dreams. After an initial spruce of the interior with new carpets and a few coats of paint to wash away all that clashing colour, the bigger job of extending the home happened in stages, over several years. “Being an old Queensland­er, everything took longer than we expected thanks to uneven floors and other problems, which in turn meant more dollars,” Angela explains. Two new bedrooms, an ensuite and laundry were added in a new wing, and walls were removed to create an open-plan kitchen, dining and living area. Fences and gates were repaired or replaced, verandahs extended, the old hallway ceiling was lifted and the roof redone. And along the way, Angela and Bronte were busy getting their hands dirty outside. “We’ve been working on the garden for years!” says Angela. Nature’s palette permeates the indoors with vivid greens and abundant shades of blue the constant companions of Angela’s classic canvas of bright white. “I love the freshness of it and the versatilit­y it brings, it’s a great foundation,” she says. “I much prefer to bring colour through with art, soft furnishing­s and floor rugs.” The interior designer has also weaved beautiful patterns into the mix with textiles she samples and sources from all over the world. “I like unique pieces, particular­ly bespoke soft furnishing­s,” she says. “I don’t tend to have any one style, I just aim to create spaces that are relaxed and comfortabl­e.” An ideal combinatio­n for a home that’s now made to measure for her family’s future.

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