A significant house designed by Harold Desbrowe Annear is reconsidered.

Annear, a pioneer of the Arts and Craft movement in Australia, created a floorplan that is best described as thoroughly, beautifully disorientating. The project rationalises some of public and private spaces. The formal living areas remain spaces for soirees, trysts and fine art, just as Annear intended.

The house, once backed and sloping south to a tennis court, is replaced with underground parking, a recreational wing and a white-washed Hollywood-esque pool area complete with three 16-metre palm trees, that also serve as spectacular lanterns by night.

The new wing and pool capture new sources of northern light.

The house as it now stands, is wrapped around a naturalistic and verdant garden with wild plantings that echo its Botanic Gardens locale. The design approach obscures the boundaries of the land property and adds a sense of living in the infinite.