RESIDENCE FOR TWO COLLECTORS
Role: Interior Designer Year Completed: 2016 while at Wheeler Kearns Architects Photographer: Tom Rossiter See Awards and Press
Key Themes: Design for Wellbeing · Bespoke Craftsmanship · Personalisation · Social and Private Balance
Collaboration: Worked directly with homeowners alongside Wheeler Kearns Architects and specialist artisans
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A philanthropic couple and lifelong collectors of art, objects and furniture wanted a home where their collection was not displayed but lived with. New acquisitions were chosen to honour what already existed and to bring cohesion across the two-storey social spaces and more intimate private floors. The result moves seamlessly between warm everyday living and quietly spectacular formal entertaining.
When a space is this closely shaped around the people within it, it becomes something that cannot be replicated or replaced.
Client, Residence for Two Collectors: “First and foremost, working with Sharlene was the best working experience my husband and I have ever had. Her listening to the two of us and amazingly blending and enhancing our ideas was extraordinary.
There was zero sense of compromise that we had often felt in past projects. We looked forward to each presentation and exploration of fabric, stones, furniture, layout, etc. We found unique pieces that we would never have found on our own. She also worked beautifully incorporating our own furniture and items we have collected over the years.
We started with raw space and from choosing to ordering to installation, Sharlene oversaw and made everything easy for us. She worked beautifully with all the people on the job from the architect to the vendors.
She succeeded in making large, open spaces elegant, warm and inviting. We have been living in our apartment for a while and are still thrilled with our space. We do much entertaining and from small dinner parties to large events our home flows just the way we envisioned due to spectacular layouts.
Sharlene has an innate sense of working toward the client’s vision and does it with grace, warmth and patience. We warned her at the onset of the project that we would not be her easiest clients. Yet, she made us feel that the warning was not necessary.”