SOUTH YARRA II

FURNITURE ART & OBJECT
Simone Haag 

PHOTOGRAPHY
Fiona Storey

Sitting in a streetscape of single-fronted Victorian cottages in South Yarra, Oban is a light-drenched sanctuary defined by a sense of bespoke tactility.

Against a canvas of white walls, cleanly pitched ceilings, wide-plank timber floorboards and garden outlooks, styling vignettes have been peppered, composed as palette cleansers against the busyness of contemporary inner-urban living that exists beyond the front door.  

The fixed stars of the home’s existence are furniture, lighting, artwork and styling choices that introduce expressions reflective of the Japanese concept of ikigai. Bestowing purpose and ritual, each piece has been procured and curated to foster the living patterns of the client while shaping an environment that is deeply restorative and in tune with the client's aesthetic leanings.

While Oban’s colour story is muted, natural and hedging on the monochromatic, a richness of textures and expressions abound to instil a quiet luxury. A Sengu dining table by Patricia Urquiola carries the sentiment of Japanese ritual while perfectly assimilating within the contemporary surroundings through clean lines and edited proportions. Accompanied by Featherstone's Scape dining chairs and completed by local ceramicist Sarah Nedovic’s Monument wall lights, a dining scene has been established that is welcoming, intriguing and singular in its visual allure.

Vital to Oban’s design language is a playful approach to shape and form tempered by its benign palette. Just as the dining room’s gestures signal a preference for purposeful pieces elevated by subtle artistry, so too does the living room. The svelte lines of a Wittman Vuelta sofa curve inwards in a token embrace while the uniform grey colour and precise design ensure it remains resilient to trend. Beneath it, a Giverny Oushak rug from Halcyon Lake brings comfort, never distracting from the garden outlook behind yet becoming softly luminous by night when the curtains are drawn and ambient lighting lit.

Oban is an eloquently composed home with poetry to be discovered in its finer details. In the earthy striations of a Trio Column side table from Fform; in the hand-shaped and chiselled Murano form of Tokujin Yoshioka’s Fountain side table; in the vintage French wall mirror that adorns the entryway and in the way all of these individually selected objects unify in a way that feels like a carefully edited collection that become perfectly contextual when activated by Oban’s light, scale and architectural expressions.