Built to last
Furniture makers Nykita and Scott Shannahan found creative synergy with their architect Ben Edwards, reenvisioning this 1970s Adelaide home while honouring its history and surroundings.
Words Casey Hutton / Architect Ply Architecture / Builder Den Berger Built
Photography Coastpark Creative / Styling Emily O’Brien
Following the renovation of their Henley Beach home, Nykita and Scott Shannahan had neighbours ringing their doorbell. “People who’d lived in the area since childhood wanted to thank us for not knocking the house down and for building something sympathetic to the neighbourhood,” says Nykita.
Embarking on their renovation in 2020, the couple asked Ben Edwards of Ply Architecture to create a modernist Palm Springs-style home that integrated natural materials. The project was also a perfect departure point for Nykita and Scott, who own Built Furniture, to design a range of timber furniture inspired by the home’s architecture and landscaping.
The original house was U-shaped, with a central kitchen and living zone linking two wings for bedrooms and bathrooms. Ben’s design replaced the centre of the U with a more expansive living and kitchen space, as well as an atrium at the entryway. “My favourite part of this design is the point of arrival,” Ben says. “The front door opens and you can see through the entirety of the space.”
“We toyed with the idea of changing the roof and including circles in the design, and Ben came through on both fronts,” Nykita recalls. While its altered roofline and Palm Springs landscaping gives the home a distinctive personality, their decision to retain the local Basket Range stone on the facade respected the style of other houses in the area.
Kitchen joinery and bar stools by Built Furniture / Art by Georgie Wilson
Pendant lights from South Drawn / Vase by Janna Schneebichler of Schapes
Nykita’s love of modernist homes goes back to her childhood “between the desert and the sea”, in a South Australian town she describes as a modernist time capsule. “I vividly remember visiting my cousin’s house and looking over the fence at the modernist ‘mansion’ next door, which was lined with palm trees and had a curved metal balustrade, a flat roof and stone feature walls,” she recalls. “As a kid, it was a huge inspiration to me.”
Now, years later, it’s Nykita’s own house that has curious passers-by peering over the fence. The home’s new design plays to this curiosity; the garden features an impressive cacti collection, scalloped walls and breeze blocks, delivering what Ben describes as “a series of curated sightlines that open the dwelling to the surrounding neighbourhood”.
Sofa and coffee table from Built Furniture
This quality of transparency is continued throughout the project, whose guiding principle was “inside spliced outside”. “At any point in the space there is a direct visual and physical connection to the outdoors,” Ben explains.
Shapes, colours and textures are repeated across thresholds. The home’s sandstone facade, preserved to great effect in the renovation, is echoed in the pool’s stone backdrop, while crazy-pave flooring delineates the kitchen workspace and is repeated on the patio.
The kitchen’s 4.5-metre-long island bench is shaped from a huge piece of solid American white oak that Nykita and Scott were able to source from the US. The couple designed their joinery, dining table, chairs and coffee table to engage with curved elements in the house and garden.
Dining table, chairs and stools from Built Furniture
Vases by Janna Schneebichler of Schapes
Bedside table from Built Furniture
“The home comes alive during the warmer months, with family and friends often gathering around the island bench and spilling into the dining spaces while the kids use the pool,” Nykita observes.
By contrast, the atmosphere in the bedrooms in the original wings of the home is geared towards rest and retreat. Nykita and Scott created custom bedside tables and bedheads referencing the old house’s weatherboards, along with minimalist timber vanities for the bathrooms.
Bed and bedside table from Built Furniture / Wall decal from Miss Pie Designs
For Nykita, Scott and Ben, the beauty of this project came from working within constraints to find innovative solutions. “Modernist homes come from a time when design was about creating a feeling and utilising creative thinking to solve problems,” Nykita points out. “Harnessing those ideas to bring a home back to life is one of the best ways, we feel, to make something unique.”
