Designed by Robert Simeoni Architects for design writer Stephen Crafti, Powell Street House champions elements of chiaroscuro and art deco within a compact floor space to create a warm home of classic proportions.

Located in the back streets of South Yarra, the house is tucked into a pocket characterised by a visually diverse streetscape. Powell Street House itself was not necessarily a home until the work conducted by Robert Simeoni married the ground and first floors of the old 1930’s brick duplex. Existing separately until recently, both floors are now congruent with each other, and contain much of the couple’s wide-ranging furniture and artwork collection.

Containing a muted interior with very little light, Robert Simeoni Architects set about remedying this within the design approach, while focussing on retaining and respecting the core elements of the house. New elements were treated as interventions which were clearly distinguishable from the original fabric, whilst being respectful to it. Minimising structural alterations to the dwelling was also a means of achieving a cost-effective outcome on a limited budget, with the only major structural changes being the removal of walls to increase fluidity. A new addition tacked to the rear of the site furthered the idea of not structurally overhauling the house, maintaining much of the character Powell Street House has developed over the decades.

Dining, kitchen and laundry facilities were located within the new addition, with a polished concrete floor. The kitchen and dining area enjoy a northern aspect to the property’s rear courtyard, via a steel framed window wall, which describes a serrated profile in plan, and delivers an intriguing quality of light to the newly created space. This ground floor addition forms a double height volume, which incorporates a carefully located high level window, and was conceived as a quiet space, with ambiguous connections between the existing and the new, the outside and the inside.

A compact central staircase consisting of dark stained timber and raw steel brings together the two previously separated levels of the building. The staircase begins and ends within the former bathroom spaces of each level, minimising internal alterations and thus remaining true to the design brief. The bathrooms were designed with a selection of materials evocative of the 1930’s architecture of the original house, including basins tiled in-situ, and the use of traditional shower curtains, selected for their modest yet sensuous qualities that reflect the heritage of the house.

The addition, and the new architectural elements generally, read as insertions within the existing fabric, and connect enigmatically with the materiality of the original. Where openings have been formed or modified, such alterations have been executed in a way which leaves clear traces of the original. Views were limited and curated through the new steel windows utilising a combination of clear and opaque glazing, using narrow reeded patterned glass, sympathetic to the original era of the house. Internal colours were selected to connect the spaces and respond to the varying volumes and light conditions throughout the house.

Powell Street House marries many things together to form a space that allows living to be at the forefront of the client’s lives. The ground and first floor, art deco and contemporary, light and dark. All of these are seen in equal measure within the design headed by Simeoni, that has ensured the house, that according to Crafti, is quintessentially theirs.

“It took a couple of years, but the renovation of my home is now complete. I love it when people come to visit, as guests or participants of one of my local architecture tours, and say: “It’s so you!” Well, shouldn’t a house always capture the personality and unique qualities of its residents? It’s dark and moody in parts and warm and textured in others.”

The Powell Street House won the Marion Mahony Award for Interior Architecture and the John and Phyllis Murphy Award for Residential Architecture – Houses (Alterations and Additions) at the 2019 Victorian Chapter of the Australian Institute of Architects.