Once in your life, if you’re lucky, you may get the chance to design and build your dream home; one that captures the imagination and allows you to express yourself and your aspirations for you and your family to enjoy for a lifetime. Today we had the chance to step into the dream home of Jesse & Seada Linardi in Collingwood and the privilege of talking to them about what they learned and how they approached their build.

Jesse and Seada know a few things about design having built up two separate design practices, DKO Architects which focuses on large scale projects across 3 countries and Slab Architecture which creates bespoke boutique homes in Australia. However, their shared passion for design took a whole new depth of meaning once they undertook the process of designing their own home.

The Linardi’s home is an exemplar for high-density, vertical living as one of two properties constructed on a small 76m2 piece of land. This brought with it a number of design challenges, one which was how to maximise the use of light throughout the home which had only one west facing facade.

Despite coming from humble suburban backgrounds, both Seada and Jesse love organised, clean, minimalist design and wanted to bring a level of sophistication, style and comfort to their everyday lives. With polished concrete floors and walls and matched seductive wooden joinery the Linardi’s needed some softer touches to compliment the strong masculine design and after noticing her work with curtains on another project Jesse reached out to Rochelle from Lovelight.

Rochelle recalls that it was important for the Lindardi’s to have a solution that gave them light but also provided privacy and matched the colour of their carefully designed external bi-fold shutters - which took inspiration from one of Seada’s favourite handbags.

‘It was love at first sight’ is how Rochelle describes the look on both Jesse and Seada’s face when they were introduced to the Laconia sheer and block out curtain with Nocturn Flint Lining from Mokum Designs James Dunlop collection. ‘Laconia is a beautiful 100% linen with Airo finish which gives it an incredibly soft and luxurious feel’ and has become one of the first things people comment on when Seada and Jesse invite people to their living room which surprised them.

Working with Rochelle was really helpful according to Seada, ‘she really helped us with the process, because we really didn’t know’, whilst Jesse really appreciated the care and time taken together to find the right solution over multiple on-site visits. This was especially true when it came to fitting dual curtains into a small pelmet. With Rochelle’s help they were able to find a compact pencil pleat heading type for a curved track to do the job.

In retrospect, Seada & Jesse believe that it would have been helpful to think about window furnishings and involve Lovelight earlier in the design process. Getting your window furnishings right ‘gives you a really good opportunity to change the way the space is...it’s not just the light it changes, it changes the way the room works...we think about it more and the power of it more’. After this experience in their own home, the Linardi’s have started thinking about window furnishings much earlier in the design process on other projects.

And it’s easy to see why, from the inside of their home the choice of curtains invite you into the room providing a sense of warmth and security for the bedrooms as well as a compelling backdrop to the statement artworks and furniture.

The next challenge for the project was to bring light into the rear of the property so that the rooms didn’t feel claustrophobic or ‘deep and dark’. For the Lindardi’s, the solution was 6 level lightwell and vertical garden traversing the house and adjoining an open air staircase.

The lightwell provided natural ventilation and a feeling of space, however it left bathrooms and ensuites exposed. A combination of motorised Baltic Translucent Oxford roller blinds and curtains were chosen to provide a seamless and discrete privacy barrier.

We were honoured and immensely proud to be a part of the Lindardi’s dream home build and are looking forward to working with them on future projects. If you have a project and would like custom window furnishings for your beautifully designed spaces please get in touch. We also have showrooms in VIC, NSW and QLD