The X FACTOR

Creative thinking is at the core of this breezy new home that beautifully balances the raw with the luxurious.

- Jackie Brygel

STREET ENTRANCE The facade is all contemporary angles realised in hardwearing materials. Timber-look aluminium cladding from Covet. Pots, The Balcony Garden.

KITCHEN This page and opposite top Cabinetry in Navurban veneer in Ravenswood, New Age Veneers. Island and splashback finished in Hermes Vangeli marble from Euro Natural Stone. Archier ‘Highline’ pendant light, Rakumba. Normann Copenhagen ‘Form’ stools, HG Furniture Solutions. Zip tap, Winning Appliances. Small bowl on island, Palmer & Penn. Assorted bowls and objects on shelves, all Rudi Rocket. PANTRY Opposite bottom This practical space is cleverly hidden behind the main cooking hub. Miele appliances, Winning Appliances.

The vision was simple, but one that has proved spectacularly effective in its execution. Neatly consolidated within a central timber pod would be the kitchen, butler’s pantry and powder room – the true hub of a luminous new family home in Sydney’s inner west.

For owners Nadia and Parry and their teenage children Lara and Alex, architect Michael Bremner’s innovative open-plan design pivoting around a curved axis made perfect sense. “Michael came up with this concept of an X-shaped house, and we realised it would make for such a functional home for our family – one with different sections and the communal pod at its centre,” says Nadia. “We came to love the idea.” As did the couple’s interior designer for the project, Linda Habak.