Home Design
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Inside a Melbourne Home That’s a Modern Twist on a Cuckoo Clock

Jaime E. Love

What do you get when you take inspiration from a cuckoo clock, Japanese architecture, and the charming qualities of historic Edwardian-era homes? The latest residential project from the geniuses at Rara Architecture. Nicknamed Cuckoo House after its clocklike form, this two-bedroom, two-bathroom home in Footscray, Australia, a neighborhood right outside of the Melbourne city center, is a prime example of taking a dated home and transforming it into something new and exciting, while still celebrating the fabric of the existing structure.

<div class="caption"> <strong>BEFORE:</strong> The original structure had a classic Edwardian cottage with a small layout, including one dark bedroom at the front, a gabled roof, a weatherboard exterior, and a surrounding veranda. In the update, Wesley moved the veranda farther out, managing to bring more natural light into the front bedroom. </div>

BEFORE: The original structure had a classic Edwardian cottage with a small layout, including one dark bedroom at the front, a gabled roof, a weatherboard exterior, and a surrounding veranda. In the update, Wesley moved the veranda farther out, managing to bring more natural light into the front bedroom.

“Footscray has been slowly undergoing a lot of gentrification over the last two decades,” says architect Wesley Spencer. “And

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Home Design
Read Time : 1 Minutes

How a Designer Turned This “Modern White Box” Into a Lively—and Functional—Family Home

Richard J. Robinson
Photo credit: Heidi's Bridge
Photo credit: Heidi’s Bridge

From House Beautiful

If there’s an interior designer in New York City who knows how to give a modern, new build apartment a warm personality with a sense of history, it’s Shanti Crawford of Indigo & Ochre Design. With a background in international human rights, Crawford’s “first forays into design were to create income generation avenues for at-risk women,” she says. “It evolved from there, but I’ve always stayed true to my roots through my firm’s focus on socially responsible and sustainable design.” This is reflected Crawford’s colorful, thoughtfully collected, and layered approach to decorating.

So, before her clients—a family with three human daughters and one canine daughter—even closed on this 2,600-square-foot, four bedroom penthouse in Brooklyn, they asked Crawford to lend her expertise as a design advisor. “I was hired before my clients closed and construction was completed to give guidance on the

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