The Melbourne suburb of Toorak is known for its lavish houses, but this grand establishment, located in the heart of the suburb, may well be one of the most opulent.
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Although the residence itself is new, it has been designed to emulate an older-style sandstone building. The interior also matches this ‘old world' theme – heavy velvet drapes and traditional couches and tables are a common theme throughout the house.
However, in other aspects the house is thoroughly modern. We were blown away by the entertainment system, in particular the home cinema, which was showcased to impressive effect with an excerpt from one of the greatest movies from the past decade, Gladiator.
But let's start at beginning. The entertainment installation was spearheaded by Melbourne-based company Sampford & Staff, best known for being the local distributor of high-end European kitchen and bathroom brands such as Gaggenau and Neff. Sampford & Staff also handles Swiss audio brand ReVox, which is arguably the star of this impressive house.
According to Sampford & Staff technical consultant, Travis Anderson, the owners Peter and Yvonne were looking for a system that was primarily easy to use but also catered for their needs.
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"Two of their key requirements were to have a main home theatre room and to have the ability to store all of their CDs on a central server," according to Anderson. "However they wanted to be able to access this from around the house to play different music in different areas of their home at any one time."
More specifically, Yvonne wanted to have hi-fi sound in the lounge and kitchen, while Peter wanted to be able to listen to different music at any time, no matter where he was in the house.
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"When entertaining, they also wanted the option of having music outside on the roof terrace, or something more relaxing while enjoying the outdoor spa," Travis Anderson adds.
The couple came into the Sampford & Staff showroom in Fitzroy and Anderson demonstrated the ReVox Multiroom system. After discussing their requirements and how they thought they would use the system and looking at the layout of the house, it was clear the ReVox system ticked all the right boxes.
"With the ReVox system, simplicity is the key to the overall design," Anderson explains. "Both Peter and Yvonne loved the ease-of-use of the keypad and display, so they can choose between different artists and tracks with one button."
