est magazine is a global design resource curating the best in architecture, design, interiors and products. Uniting the creative talents of architects, designers, photographers, stylists, writers and tastemakers, est inspires exceptional living.
Most of my earliest memories revolve around being outside in the fresh air – part of growing up as a ‘farm kid’. It’s something not lost on me today, and so beyond the scientific evidence, I wanted this issue to recognise how our homes support our intrinsic connection to nature. On the cover, the recently revised River House by Melbourne-based Susi Leeton Architecture + Interiors emulates the slow-flowing river below it in every aspect of its design and intuitive garden by Myles Baldwin Design. Building on this, we explore the collaborative synergy between eight Australian architects and landscape architects in our special feature, Finding Connection. I speak with British landscape designer Miranda Brooks on her family’s move from Brooklyn to the bucolic beauty of the Cotswolds in a transformed farmhouse…
ERIC PETSCHEK Eric is a design enthusiast who spun his training in interior architecture into a career taking photographs of the spaces he enjoys occupying. He brings his design training to bear in the composition of his images and in post-production, where he strives to make the design intent as salient as possible. He photographed Steven Harris Architects’ Bridge Hampton House in this issue, emphasising the project’s dialogue with the coastal setting. @cb LISA COHEN Lisa Cohen has photographed all things design and lifestyle for more than 20 years. Her career began as a shoot stylist/art director on interior magazines in London where, having hired photographers to help execute her creative concepts, she found that the right photographer transformed a good idea into a great one. Lisa captured the impact…
LOCATION Cotswolds, UK Just before 2020, you decided to “change your lives” after “years of dreaming, planning, and lots of work”. This decision meant moving from Brooklyn to the 17th-century Catswood Farm in the Cotswolds with your husband Bastien Halard, a designer, and daughters Poppy and Violette Grey. What led you to this decision, and why was Catswood Farm the right choice? We spent many years looking at houses and farms, from the Catskills to Maryland and all over England. The children, having ponies that lived at my ex-husband’s farm, cemented the idea of England, plus my increasing-with-the-years homesickness for the seasons I grew up with. A friend told me the farmer who lived at Catswood Farm had passed away, so I wrote a letter to the family but never…
LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT MARC CONLON CONLON GROUP What was the first project you worked on with architect Shaun Lockyer? Amaroo residence on Sunshine Beach. It was an existing landscape on the beachfront and was more about stripping back the built form and reconnecting with the dune. Our response was to reclaim and become part of the dune, reinstating the landscape up to the house and on its host trailing native dunal species. It was the start of our blurring of the lines – a real architectural collaboration. What makes your collaboration with Shaun Lockyer Architects so effective? Passion and enthusiasm; a different way of thinking rather than for the sake of; not directly challenging but asking the question and simplifying the process. There is synergy in how we both present to…
LANDSCAPE DESIGNER AMANDA OLIVER AMANDA OLIVER GARDENS What was the first project you worked on with Kennedy Nolan? Deepdene House in 2014. Kennedy Nolan’s name kept popping up as they had recommended me to various people, and then Rachel Nolan rang me and asked me to meet to discuss a project. Deepdene was a great introduction to their work; it exemplified their originality in design and connection to the garden and landscape so well. What makes your collaboration with Kennedy Nolan so effective? From the very start, Kennedy Nolan recognised the focus on plants in my garden designs. They were looking for someone who created gardens rather than ‘outdoor rooms’, whose emphasis was on the soft rather than hard-built aspects of contemporary landscape design. We both love a bold use…
LANDSCAPE CONSULTANT WILL DANGAR DANGAR BARIN SMITH What was the first project you worked on with architect Luigi Rosselli? I first worked with Luigi on a very small penthouse development in Sydney’s CBD for a property developer called Zaro Elizov, who realised the value of a good landscape outcome. This was in the early 1990s. We have worked together ever since. What makes your collaboration with Luigi Rosselli Architects so effective? Luigi and I share the same views about how a landscape and building should interact. He likes his buildings to be feathered by the landscape, which suits my style. We want the building to feel like it has been inserted into an existing landscape. Our relationship relies on both of us having an efficient way of working and an…
