When interior designer Susannah Matheson was growing up, she was one of seven children and shared a bedroom with her younger sister, Olivia. “We had a line of Sellotape down the centre of the room. I’m obsessively tidy, so my side was pristine; hers was, shall we say, ‘lived in’,” laughs Susannah.
For some, such close quarters might have been a death-knell for their relationship but, as soon as their studies were over, the pair set off on their OE together. “We lived in London in the same room, and we travelled the world,” continues Susannah. Safe to say then that, when it came to collaborating on the interiors of Olivia’s house, she could almost read her mind.
This Devonport villa, one street back from Cheltenham Beach, is as pretty as they come. It’s also a stone’s throw from where the sisters grew up — in fact, it belonged to a schoolfriend back in the day. When it came on the market, it wasn’t hard to imagine it as a lovely family home.
After 12 years of living here with her husband and their three children (two boys, now 14 and 11, and a girl, 8), Olivia felt it was time to put their stamp on the place. The couple called in architect Greg Jones to help update the layout, working within strict heritage guidelines. And they commissioned Susannah, who runs her business, Island Interiors, from both Waiheke and Devonport, to fit out a house where ‘comfortability’ was the over-riding factor. “I didn’t want it to be too precious,” says Olivia.
A long living room on the northern elevation was divided into bedrooms for the boys plus a laundry/mud room (where dogs, Pebbles and Basil, submit begrudgingly to an occasional bath) and the downstairs main suite was made into a bedroom for their daughter and a separate family bathroom.
On the upstairs level, tucked under the eaves, rooms were refashioned into a luxurious parents’ retreat, complete with a separate living area. Finally, a new extension was constructed projecting into the west-facing back garden. Divided from the original dwelling by a pair of black steel doors, it acts as social central. “This is a house that is constantly filled with large groups,” explains Susannah. “We have a huge extended family but also it’s a meeting point for school groups or the rugby club or the golf girls.”
Architecturally, the extension is detailed enough to hark back to the villa (think tongue-and-groove ceilings) but not as ornate. Nevertheless, with a 12-foot stud, there were generous volumes to fill — and not just with visitors. Minimalism be damned: Olivia loves to collect, and she isn’t afraid of colour. That’s evident in the uber-expressive marble she chose for the kitchen benches. “I saw it in the showroom and just fell for it,” she says. “I loved its purpley, plum colour.”
and modern.
Susannah knew her sister’s confident choice needed to be tied in with the rest of the open-plan area. She suggested dark-timber cabinetry for the main kitchen to bring a sense of smart masculinity to the palette but went all-out with plum-toned cupboards in the hidden scullery. A pair of bespoke leather Togo chairs a similar shade of sangria pick up the theme in the adjoining living room.
Such fruity shades bring incredible joie de vivre to the spaces, keeping them as lively as the atmosphere. While the children’s rooms are variously painted dirty pink, green and blue (shades which combine in the shared bathroom, so everyone feels like they have a stake), wow-factor wallpaper is used to statement effect: big, blowsy blooms in the laundry are cheerful at chore-time; opulent kaleidoscopic flowers turn the powder room into a talking point; and a jazzy design that papers Olivia’s dressing room puts a positive spin into her morning routine.
The finishes may seem like a random riot of colour and pattern, but there’s a system to the selection. “Since there are no windows in the powder room, we wanted to give it a nice bright punch,” says Susannah. She also chose low-key dark-brown tiles for the ensuite. They team tonally with the painterly purple marble used on the vanity but ensure a gentler wake-up call.
Amidst the apparent chaos, there is a consistent palette — no bright white and no silver finishes was a rule — and, where the severity of straight lines got too much, Susannah broke it up with softer shapes. The fluted bedhead in the main suite echoes the fluted finish of built-in cabinetry downstairs as well as the fluted fronts of splashback tiles in the family bathroom and laundry.
Olivia admits that, while she knows what she likes and has an eye for something different, she relied on Susannah to make it happen. “She knew where to send me to look for fittings and finishes, and I could be bold precisely because she was my safety net,” she says.
Was there anything they disagreed on? The greatest debate came in the kitchen, Susannah confesses. With no sink in the main body of the space, she argued for a special pot-filler tap above the hob on the back wall. “Olivia didn’t think it was necessary, and said she would use the taps in the scullery.” Now, of course, she uses the pot filler daily.
From go to whoa, this significant project took three years. “But it was a hundred per cent worth it,” says Olivia, who loves that the family use every room, every day. And there are many special moments. They move from sunrise when she wakes up in bed to a view over Mount Victoria, to enjoying a cup of tea in the upstairs TV lounge with a view through pōhutukawa across the rooftops to Rangitoto, to entertaining a crowd around that purple-proud kitchen bench in the late afternoon. Although she hasn’t moved far from her childhood stomping ground, she couldn’t think of a better place to be.
Words Claire McCall
Photography Jackie Meiring