This stunning apartment renovation seamlessly creates ample storage whilst accentuating the spacious proportions of the former chocolate factory building.

Each space in the one bedroom open plan apartment has its own unique character. We've used vertical floor to ceiling bookshelves and storage to make the large and undefined entry area into a home office and extensive library and draw attention to the high ceilings. The shelving hides a myriad of essentials including scarves, bags, bike helmets, keys, printer and art supplies, and of course a lot of books. The timber rolling library ladder gives an old-world character and allows access to books right up to the high ceiling level.

In the living room the new joinery has a horizontal form that extends the sense of space out to the windows and outside. Long low joinery and wall mounted art shelves allow for a rotating display of the owners’ extensive art collection. A custom folded raw steel stair provides easy access to additional storage space located on a mezzanine above the bathroom.

These are the client's words:
We came to Ande Bunbury Architects with a clear idea of what we needed but only a vague idea of what that might look like.

The result is something we love – a bespoke, elegant and creative solution to house our collections of art and books that maximises the high ceilings in our small apartment and integrates seamlessly with the industrial features of a 100 year old warehouse loft. Ande's design has created ‘rooms’ without compromising the apartment's grand sense of scale and adds cohesion to the apartment as a whole.

Ande was great to work with – she struck a perfect balance between responding to our ideas and guiding our thinking. Where we landed was a design that met our brief entirely but which was more than we’d imagined it could be.

To create storage for a large collection of books, tchotchkes and artworks in an existing one bedroom apartment. In addition, the entry was previous a long, wide space which was full of clutter so they really wanted to tidy everything away so the first impression was of orderliness, not mess. And in such a small space they really couldn't have any wasted space so the entry area needed to become much more functional.

There was an existing storage space located above the bathroom which was a blessing but accessing it meant a ladder needed to be stored somewhere in the apartment. We got around this by building a stylish custom-made folded steel stair which becomes a display space in the main living area

Making use of the high ceilings.
Finding space to store all the different types of things from small ornaments to bicycles, helmets, printer, artworks not on display and so on.
Creating a sense of a 'room' with a specific function in the entry hallway. It is now a dedicated library and workspace whilst still open to the rest of the living areas for borrowed light.
Getting everything (including a 6m benchtop) in via a staircase or lift.

- Firstly, we wanted to accentuate the fantastic height of this apartment, and we wanted to make use of this for storage and in particular to have bookshelves extending right to the ceiling. A rolling library ladder allows access to the shelves like Audrey Hepburn in the movie 'Funny Face' 
- The clients always knew they had too much art to be able to display it all at once so we devised a system of shelves of different heights and spacings so art displays could be rotated like a gallery. The shelves were custom designed and meant that fixings into the walls were not required.
- The bespoke folded steel stair gives stylish access to the storage space over the bathroom

Team:

Architects: Ande Bunbury Architects

Builder:  Galligan Builders

Photographer: Drew Echberg

Materials Used:

Rolling Ladders Australia Quiet Glide rolling library ladder
Blum Metabox Metafile filing cabinet drawers
Hettich runners to custom made keyboard drawer
Laminex Green First 0 VOC MDF used for joinery
Resene 0 VOC paints
folded raw steel staircase with wax finish
Masson For Light Click COB recessed LED spotlight

Benchtops recycled Vic Ash

Feature shelves Vic Ash veneer
cutout handles typically or Blum ‘Tip On’ push catches
Rolling Ladders Australia Quiet Glide rolling library ladder
Blum Metabox Metafile filing cabinet drawers
Hettich runners to custom made keyboard drawer

Masson For Light Click COB recessed LED spotlight