Anthony Denman:
So you started in interior design in Melbourne.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I studied architecture and I worked at SJB originally as an architect for about 18 months. They were working on the Crown Casino. There was this thing called Architects in Association, so there was a whole lot of architects that were working on different parts of that building. And SJB came in to help them because they couldn’t get through it all. So there was a whole lot of contractors, SJB was one of them. And then they also won some hospitality heat nightclub. I think it was the main ballroomy thing and Andrew Parr was running that and I got seconded onto it and then I just loved it. So I stayed on board and then when we got the project in Sydney, I asked him, I said, “Can I go up to Sydney to open the studio?” Because I thought otherwise they’re going to go and hire someone new.
And he said, “Yeah, you can go up and do it.” So I went between Melbourne and Sydney, I reckon, for about six to 12 months and then stayed in Sydney. We opened up in Surry Hills. We did a whole lot of hospitality things and then it sort of grew from there. So what happened is my business partner, John, he came and worked for us. That must have been 28 years ago or something, maybe 2001 or something. And then over the years we bought in as partners at SJB and we eventually bought Andrew out so it was just John and I, and that’s when we rebranded. That’s when we were like, “Okay, let’s just take the show under our own names and do our own thing.”

Anthony Denman:
Your name’s on the door, right?

Kirsten Stanisch:
You’re standing by everything that you do, aren’t you? You can’t get away from it. So that was fun to do that. Well, it wasn’t fun. It was scary and it was fun at the same time.

Anthony Denman:
What’s so special about Halcyon?.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Oh it’s it’s a real sanctuary. Like it’s a sanctuary in a space. That would be something that I would look at down there knowing that you’re having to step away and you’re having a moment, you know, a closed moment It’s a real sanctuary. It’s just important in Sydney because it is an intense city and there’s a lot going on. So I think being able to go home and have somewhere that you really can just not see movement or accept stuff that you’ve got control of is kind of nice.
Down at Bondi is you can see a horizon, and seeing a horizon is apparently the most natural thing that your body craves for good circadian rhythms and all of those sorts of things. It’s really important to see that. Down in Bondi, if you go down to that beach every day, you’re going to see that every day whereas a lot of places in Sydney, you wouldn’t see that at all every day and that probably adds something to everybody’s underlying stress levels or something. There’s all of those things that they say, walking on grass in bare feet or walking on sand in bare feet, seeing a horizon, just some things that are very, very natural are just important to us. We’re animals ourselves. We kind of got our fundamental needs that I think we’re so smart we block, but they are important to us.

Anthony Denman:
Most people just walk around in their own head all the time. They’re never really present or appreciative of the natural world. I’m really interested in this idea of the urban environment merging with that natural world and I think the way the rocks behave, for example, and stone.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah. They’re affected by the environment. They’re affected by the weather. They’re affected by the waves. They’re affected by so many things. There’s kind of a story in them, isn’t there, that you see? I think that’s also why for interiors or building is things being built out of materials that we can understand as humans like rock, stone, marble, timber, those things are a little bit more unprocessed. I think our brain just feels a bit more organised and a bit more calm around those things as well. It’s not confusing to our instinct. So I think there’s a lot of stuff like that. I’m sure there’s papers and things written on it, but I think those things help organise your brain so your brain can actually think about the things you want to think about, it’s not getting stressed out about trying to work out what’s going on with the environment.
I think, to a certain extent, if the world population keeps going like it’s going and we need people to live somewhere, you’re going to always have to have some more density in how we build. So you will have more things of density meeting water lines, but my feeling is it should have a unprocessed sense of construction and it’s also probably more environmental in terms of that recycling, upcycling, all of those things of materials. And as a concept, it’s a nice concept. Of course, it’s very expensive, but I think that’s my philosophy about that.

Anthony Denman:
Wow, I’ve never ever heard it articulated like that. That’s incredible. When we were creating our little dialogue here, we were talking about things like you’re really interested, from a design perspective, how the water kind of meets the sand.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah. We looked at those moments where those two things happen and what happens at that point. It is interesting, isn’t it, those lines about where things come through. That’s what we were talking about, the timber in the apartments in the interiors. We’ve got timber that’s got a bit of an effect on it. It’s got a texture to it. It feels a little bit less processed. In the penthouse, we’ve got the cutout timber again that feels very sculpted and shaped and I hope it makes those materials feel even more precious than they really are as well. So it was all those kinds of things that we were thinking about. It’s also Liam’s building, how we start layering them into those spaces.
The building’s got a lot of sophistication to it, but there’s a kind of underlying organised simplicity to the building as well. You kind of want the interiors to feel a bit like that too. It’s not about decoration at every moment and every space. It’s really about beautiful big spaces and some objects within the space that feel like they’ve have their place, but it’s not coated, it’s not heavy. It’s hopefully as thoughtful as we can be in it, texture and softness and it feels like outside forces have kind of shaped it a little bit more.

Anthony Denman:
I had to go and find a piece of driftwood recently and when you pick up a piece of timber that’s been in the ocean for such a long period of time, God knows where it’s been and what its journey looked like, but when you pick it up, it doesn’t even feel like timber in a way.

Kirsten Stanisch:
It feels different and it feels… Yeah.

Anthony Denman:
It’s so smooth. But again, that comment that you made about we’re told every day now that you shouldn’t eat overly processed foods.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I think it’s the same thing, it doesn’t make sense. Chemicals injected into building materials, they have to go somewhere. I think the less you have in there, the better. For this project, we selected materials that will wear beautifully, but sometimes a few marks and a few things is a good indication that you’ve got materials that are probably a lot more healthy for you than materials that don’t mark. Although in saying that, glazed porcelain is amazing and we have used that too and that’s been around forever. It’s a super beautiful, clean material, but still, it’s a really basic material that’s been fired.
It’s really the chemical that has happened to it. It’s been heavily fired and that creates that glass or the glaze. I think those things are important. I think they’re really important. And also, I think if there’s the less chemicals in it, the more chance there is of reusing things, the way things are fixed and the way things… Stone, for example, if it’s not adhesive fixed in or not used a lot of additives, it can be recycled into terrazzo or hopefully bench tops can be reused and those kinds of things. So it is important and I think they’ll pick up more and more about the way we actually construct interiors so things can be reused as well.

Anthony Denman:
That’s a really unique insight.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Well, we try and think about those things, but I think we also try a lot to design things that don’t look like they’re in fashion in this second is really important to us and that can be really, really challenging, especially in multi-res because they think we’re designing something that’s out of date, whereas we believe it’s much more forward-thinking for the reason too, like you need things to…
Nothing’s ever going to look timeless, but you want things to be like that incredible Schiaparelli dress or something that might have been designed 50 years ago, but you still look at it and you go, “That’s an amazing thing. That was incredible.” So trying to find a way to do that. Our ultimate aim is that we have all our projects on our website forever because they all look relevant from day one through, but it’s hard to unsee things. Just trying to avoid some of the very popular design choices is something we consciously try and do.

Anthony Denman:
When we were chatting to Liam, I didn’t even have to ask him the question about what it was like collaborating with you guys. He just offered it up as being a really great experience and something that he really values because you’re so invested in what you do.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Look, we’re invested in every project we take on, I would say, especially on a project like this because we don’t really know who’s going to be buying the apartments. We don’t know them personally, so we spend so much time thinking about who they might be and working a lot with the project team to get a lot more input. We really value everybody’s, as frustrating as it is as a designer, because you only want to hear one person giving you instructions, but I think for these types of projects, we really do value everyone telling us what they think because ultimately if it’s going to be a whole lot of different people living there, we kind of like to think, “Oh, that person’s thinking completely differently than I would have thought or someone else would have thought,” so that we can really take the design we hope to be something that a lot of people will like.
But in terms of working with MHNDU and Liam, they are really good to work with because what I was saying too is the directors of MHNDU, the design directors, are so present in all the projects. So there’s a lot of care, a lot of care that they put into the architecture. They develop a concept and they are really true to their concept. They’re really thorough with the detailing. I also think they are quite timeless designers in the way they put their projects together. And they also give us really good spaces to work with. Some architects can give you spaces for the interiors that feel quite left over and you’re really trying to dress something up and make something work and you’ve got that challenge before you’ve even started designing the space. MHNDU really think about all of their spaces, their volumes, the experience of moving through, but they don’t design it for us at the same time.
So they give us options to work with them. I think the lobby on this project is probably one of my most favourite lobbies that I’ve designed so far. So that’s been really great. And it really does connect back into the landscape too. So that main lobby that you get to see on both ends, we’re pretty lucky that they’ve given us a building that’s got the light coming in at both ends and it’s really a special building.

Anthony Denman:
You don’t often get to work on a project that you want to live in, right?

Kirsten Stanisch:
It’s so true though. It’s really special when you get a project, when you think, “I would really like to live there myself.” The things about it that I really love, it’s like we were talking about before, that sense of sanctuary to me of going home and recharging and having those little cocoon moments, but coupled with actually having outlook is super special. You’re just not going to get that in many places.
And the scale of the building, it’s small, it’s boutique size, you’re not with a whole lot of different people. You’ll probably end up being with your friends in the building or there’ll probably be some special moments between the people that live in the building, but there’s also enough room that if my dog doesn’t like your dog, there’s plenty of room to navigate the space. It still has all of that great amenity, but it really feels like a very special place, I think.

Anthony Denman:
Yeah. No, there’s no doubt about that.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah, it’s good.

Anthony Denman:
The thing I’m interested in is understanding how the wind shapes the stone and the water shapes the sand, but not being so literal with that.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I think being absolutely not literal because I think if you’re too literal with things, it can get cliched really quickly and can border on tacky, kind of. It’s not necessarily putting into people’s face, “Oh, that’s what it is, that’s what it represents.” It’s the feeling that you get from touching those things or seeing those things, which is which we were talking about is it makes your natural brain understand what that material or that element actually really is and that we feel familiar with it. I think bringing in those things in a subtle way, it’s an elegant way, it’s still very elegant, but I think it enhances some of the qualities of the materials.
So the beautiful marbles that we’ve been lucky enough to select for this project, you put a different finish on those marbles at different times. You understand the different depth of how incredible these materials are because you see colours, you see vibrancy, you see softness, you see pattern differently when you finish it differently. So I think you get a real reading of that. There’s light and shade to things and I think all of those things just make something more special.

Anthony Denman:
Elegance-

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah, it’s very elegant.

Anthony Denman:
… with purpose?

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah, it is elegance with purpose.

Anthony Denman:
Purposeful elegance.

Kirsten Stanisch:
We were really quite obsessed with this project about having a quiet luxury, we were calling it, but a quieter kind of elegance. We don’t want to look like it’s something that you’ve seen on Instagram or Pinterest and it has something that says luxury underneath it. It’s very understated. It’s like people that know that it is beautiful and for people that appreciate it, but they’re there to appreciate it and love it themselves for appreciation. They’re more interested in how their response to the space is going to be than what their friends’ response to the space will be. It’s primarily something that is for them and they invite their friends and family into the spaces because they want to give them that same joy about it, but they’re not getting their joy out of their friends seeing it, primarily. There’s more subtlety to it.
We see a lot of projects are very strong. It’s just excessive use of expensive natural resources like stone. And what we want to do is you wanted to use these materials in a way that demonstrates how precious they are. It’s like great dark chocolate, you don’t want to eat a whole bucket full. It’s about a bit more restraint. Like I said, it’s about sophistication, about elegance, about someone that really understands these things and appreciation to it that’s different than just a… It’s not a high-consumer approach to design, it’s a very select approach to design.

Anthony Denman:
Have you always been that restrained?

Kirsten Stanisch:
We’ve gone through different periods where we’ve done different things and we can do things that have that more traditional opulent viewpoint, but in my heart I prefer things that are restrained. There’s a bit more kindness in things that aren’t so opulent. Opulent can be fun in the right context, but I don’t think this is the context for it. Our interiors are part of everything else that’s going on.
It’s not about creating these interiors that take over the whole experience of everything that they’re… In this beautiful natural landscape of Bondi, you’ve got this amazing piece of architecture. You’ve got this beautiful landscape around you, and we want our part of the interiors to be on equal footing with them, not to be louder or softer, but we just want there to be a very harmonious connection between all the design points of this whole development.

Anthony Denman:
And I know the quiet luxury is a thing.

Kirsten Stanisch:
It’s cliched, isn’t it?

Anthony Denman:
It’s a thing for you. It’s cliched. The word luxury-

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah, first word, isn’t it?

Anthony Denman:
But it doesn’t really matter because it’s been killed off. The industry killed it off years ago.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah.

Anthony Denman:
I was more interested in what it really means to you, which you articulated beautifully. Where does that restraint come from, do you think?

Kirsten Stanisch:
It may be a few things. Growing up in Melbourne and growing up at the period I did and how I grew up in the house I grew up in. My mUm, her parents were Presbyterian missionaries actually, Outback missionaries. So they’re the extreme of sparseness and lack of things is important to them. On my mom’s side of the family, there’s probably not the interest in accumulating material things. It’s just not part of that side of the family. My dad, definitely, he kept migrant family, made good. He probably enjoys a bit more flash.

Anthony Denman:
Of the two.

Kirsten Stanisch:
But it’s always been about, you don’t need to put things in people’s faces either. It’s about things that you enjoy and appreciate and that you want to have for a long time, that you’re not going to be wanting to cash things in, change things over, or constantly change things. So it’s probably that. And then you just evolve your own sense of taste of what you like. I think you just have something innately that you appreciate as a person. But again, not to say I don’t go into some other designers’ places that can be completely over the top and go, “Oh my God, I love this.” I appreciate it. How would I say? I’m probably like the person that does dog rescue and they rescue every dog and they love it, but you still have your favoUrite breed. And I think that, for me, is a small, quieter way of doing things, but I love all design.

Anthony Denman:
Yeah. When did you realise you were going to be an interior designer?

Kirsten Stanisch:
I’m not one of these people that said, “Oh my God, I want to be an architect or designer from the day I was born.” It wasn’t until I started an arts degree. I knew that that really wasn’t what I wanted to do, and it was then that I spent a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to do. So I was probably 18. And it falls into place. The things that I like and the things that I like about architecture and interiors completely align. It’s just that I never thought, “Oh, that means I’m an interior designer,” or, “That means I’m an architect.” I just didn’t put those two things together.

Anthony Denman:
So kind of hard to make an apartment feel like it’s a single residence, is it?

Kirsten Stanisch:
A single residence is always going to be different because we know who the client is. We have one or two people generally as clients so when we do apartment design for these types of apartments, there’s this metaphysical client out there or there’s a number of them that we’re thinking about who they could be, so that’s really different and very challenging, especially when we’re doing projects like this because all I want is I want people who live there to love it as much as I do. That’s really what we want from the deepest parts of our hearts. But I think these apartments, the reason that they veer to me almost a bit more single residential than apartments, well, the first thing is the number of apartments. There’s few apartments so you’re not sharing the common areas with many people.
So that’s, I think, the first part. The second part is they’re big apartments. They’ve got a lot of light and a lot of output. So every room pretty much has a window in it and you’ve got the amenity that we would put in a house, butler’s pantries, some of them have powder rooms. The living spaces are actually good scales, spaces, good dining areas like we would scale to a house, because what can happen quite often in apartment developments is there might be a lot of bedrooms, but the living areas are tiny and not really scaled as we would a house. I think those kinds of base things just give this ultimate sense that it just feels more like a house. And then the plan also has zoning. You can go into a bedroom or a study area and someone’s going to have to come and walk down the hallway and tell you that dinner’s ready. You can’t just say, “Dinner’s ready.” So the scale of that makes it feel much more like a house.

Anthony Denman:
So interesting. I love the way you explain those interiors and it’s about not showing those interiors off but letting people experience them the way in which you want to experience them yourself and just having that deep understanding around what is enduring quality and what will stand the test of time.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I think that’s why a buyer will like it.

Anthony Denman:
Yeah. And I think once you land on that inside, you really start to land on the right solutions. And yes, definitely, it helps so much to be part of a great team.

Kirsten Stanisch:
You know what? The team has been really good on this, haven’t they?

Anthony Denman:
Yeah.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I feel everyone is working towards the same outcome and everyone supported everyone. There’s obviously different opinions and there’s going to always be, but I think we all like working together and we all really want to make this happen. And sometimes that doesn’t happen on projects, unfortunately, but I feel that was very strong on this from the client to architecture to landscape to all people involved.

Anthony Denman:
Great aren’t they?.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Everyone really cares.

Anthony Denman:
And engaged, right?

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah.

Anthony Denman:
In life, that’s it if you want to produce the very best work. And it’s not always easy to do. And I think a lot of the time it comes back to commercial viability and how you allocate your time to certain things and what you want out of life.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I think it’s all those things, isn’t it?

Anthony Denman:
Yeah.

Kirsten Stanisch:
It’s also the team respecting that everyone’s time does have a value on it. They spent a lot of time upfront putting the team together. So they didn’t bring people in that they didn’t think were capable of the tasks so that they kind of know, “We know you can do it.” They’re not pushing us out of our lanes. They want us to do what we’re proud of and that makes a difference. And sometimes you can get that deeper understanding of everybody’s creative roles, whether they understand that they did that or not, that’s how I feel that they did. They probably don’t think about it as consciously as that, but you select your professionals, you nominate them, and then you back them and you believe in them and you get excited by them. It’s really important.

Anthony Denman:
I think intuitively that happens.

Kirsten Stanisch:
It must.

Anthony Denman:
I just want to talk about, and here’s that word again, but in context I think it’s fine, the luxury of space.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yes. I guess luxury to me is we’ve got to get away from the fact that people think luxury and they think flash and they think oligarch and they think loud and they think labeled with an expensive thing, they think branded, all of those kinds of things. Luxury is not, I guess, what we’re talking about with this project. Luxury is way more sophisticated, way more intrinsic. Luxury, to me, can be someone beautifully hand stitching the edge of a rug or something that doesn’t scream expensive, but it’s so beautiful and the time that’s spent and the care, there’s a luxury in that. So I think it’s really important that people understand what luxury really means.
It’s not just expensive is the only part about it. The luxury of space and time and thought and care and love and all of those things that go into those things and longevity. Something that is luxurious should have a longevity to it. It might be a luxurious chocolate or something, it doesn’t have longevity, but it has a longevity in the memory of that thing or the specialness of it. I think there’s something very big about that. But the luxury of space, I think it’s ultimately… I laugh about my dreams of having a house that has absolutely nothing in it except one piece of clothing and a hose and that’s it and then you’ve got a big space around you. How amazing. That’s luxury, but you couldn’t live like that. So I think-

Anthony Denman:
It sounds good to me.

Kirsten Stanisch:
I know. Just that dream of what that would be. Maybe a bed, maybe you need a-

Anthony Denman:
Obviously.

Kirsten Stanisch:
… comfy cushion on the floor. Yeah. So I think just having the ability to move around and feel freedom of that is also about being able to have a lot of people in your space if you want. I imagine a lot of these people that will be living here will have big families or entertaining. That can really become a hub that I think that can give you, but I think the sense of the luxury of space about this isn’t just about the floor area, it’s about having that outlook. The outlook extends it so much. So even luxury of space can be obtained by this, the viewpoints outside. So I think you’re going to have the sense that it’s even bigger than that floor area would show you on a floor plan. Yeah.

Anthony Denman:
The green and the blue and just the space between you and your neighbour in that location.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Yeah. It’s air. It’s opening a window and clean air is going to flow through your apartment. That’s incredible. That’s something to really enjoy and you’re going to smell this ocean and really, that’s pretty magical.

Anthony Denman:
Yeah, totally.

Kirsten Stanisch:
Look, I think the thing about Bondi is I don’t think you have to be a sunbaker to enjoy the beach because it is somewhere that in the evening is beautiful to just be near it. To see it is a really beautiful thing to do. Dinner or lunch at Icebergs is beyond sensational and the walk along the coastline is really incredible and that just keeps getting longer and better. So there’s a lot of moments down there. The grass just in front of the beach is also really beautiful there. Being able to sit on a hill on grass is…
Anywhere that you can sit on grass I think is lovely, but there’s the amenity of being able to go and get something really great for brunch or for lunch or for dinner and be so close to that water at the same time. Again, it’s just about the atmosphere of the air because you do have the saltiness of the air, the cleanness of the air down there. The air just feels very different than anywhere else in Sydney, but you’re still really almost in the inner city of Sydney. So it moves, it feels fresh. I think all of those things and it’s whether, like me, as I said, I’m not a sunbaker, but there’s so much to Bondi that is still fabulous. Look, there’s no doubt if I had a pool in my own building like I did in this building, maybe I would sunbake a bit more.

Anthony Denman:
Well, yeah. I don’t know. I think I’m not a sunbaker. I’m a surfer so obviously I’m just-

Kirsten Stanisch:
Secondhand sunbaker.

Anthony Denman:
But none of us would actually literally lie on the beach and sunbake. But certainly, I think just being in that environment is invigorating. I think we’re done. Thank you so much. If somebody wants to get in touch with you, what’s the best way for them to do that?

Kirsten Stanisch:
I think if you wanted to get in touch, we’ve got a beautiful studio in Surry Hills. If you give the studio a call, that’s the best way to get in contact.

Anthony Denman:
Who designed your office, by the way?

Kirsten Stanisch:
John and I both did.

Anthony Denman:
What was that experience?

Kirsten Stanisch:
Oh, it’s fun. But you know what? John and I actually designed most of the projects. We’ll have a lead on it, but we call it peer review in the office. Someone will take the lead of design lead and then we’ll often sit down and workshop it after that.

Anthony Denman:
It must be a pretty confronting little exercise.

Kirsten Stanisch:
If you know someone really well. I get more spooked if we have a workshop and he doesn’t pick up something. He just says, “Oh, if that’s good.” I’m like, “No, it’s not. You haven’t paid attention properly. You need to crit.” But I think because we’re older, we went through uni when they used to be called crits when you’d present your work and they’d have a go at you about it, which they’re not allowed to do anymore. So that’s our background. So I guess with each other we’re very frank about it because I think it’s like Cath & Kim, you got to be. You got to be frank in this world, don’t you? Like half day night. That’s how we work anyway.

Anthony Denman:
Love it.

Kirsten Stanisch:
But I think because I trust him, he trusts me. I really, really, really value his opinion. I think if someone else did it to me, I probably don’t know what I’d do, cry?

Anthony Denman:
Awesome.

Kirsten Stanisch:
That’s great.