The Standard Hotels group has partnered with Melbourne-based property developer DealCorp to open the chain’s first luxury lodging in Australia. Located in the eclectic suburb of Fitzroy, in central Melbourne, the opening will expand upon The Standard’s portfolio of designer hotels, some of which are located in New York, Miami and London, as well as a resort in the Maldives.

With the remains of the former tenants cleared out, the first hurdle the designers were faced with was a lack of daylight across the 745-square-metre floor plan. “Despite its large footprint, the existing space had very little access to natural light,” explains the Ivy Studio team. “Only the front facade and the main staircase have […]

3 House by Channon Architects and Burton Architects explores the pragmatic versatility of masonry in medium density housing on small lots. Comprising an office, a granny flat and a family home, the project focusses on an adaptive plan, where the functions of its self-contained spaces can change when needed.
 Located on a corner block in New Farm, Brisbane, the site was already occupied by a four-room workers’ cottage. The reimagined cottage was the first dwelling to be developed, becoming an office with a granny flat and car park tucked underneath, followed by a separate 3-bedroom house with two-car garage constructed at the rear.

It’s long been said that grocery shopping on an empty stomach doesn't bode well for your hip pocket. That maxim is now crossing the aisles into the design realm as a mouth-watering spread of food-inspired furnishings enters the marketplace, with everything from rugs mimicking fried eggs, sofas that pass as oversized hotdogs and buttery corncob stools out to tempt tastebuds. And empty wallets.

The storied past of Geelong in the southwest of Melbourne has undoubtedly contributed to placing the bay-side region on the map. The city is well-known for its woollen mills that coincided with Geelong’s founding in 1837 and the National Wool Museum that now pays tribute to the industry’s heyday. There’s the circa-1859 Geelong AFL club (one of the world’s oldest clubs) and, of course, the now-shuttered Ford factory that was home of manufacturing for the iconic Falcon and the family of motor-vehicles that followed suit. But there’s another claim to fame to be added to the city’s brag-list: the region is the birthplace of retail empire Cotton On Group.

Overlooking the famed Malecón promenade in the historic heart of La Paz, Mexico, the Baja Club’s springtime opening is a welcome ray of sunshine on the global travel horizon. Located on the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico’s northwest, the Grupo Habita-owned venue occupies an early 20th century hacienda, reborn at the hands of design firms Max von Werz Arquitectos and Jaune Architecture. The designer destination now stands as a glorious example of adaptive reuse, comprising 32 guest rooms and suites, a pool and spa, restaurant, and a rooftop bar that’s already a smash-hit. “After all, this wouldn’t be a Grupo Habita project if it didn’t have the hippest sundowner joint in town,” quips Grupo Habita co-founders Carlos Couturier and Moisés Micha.

When fire destroyed the original guest house of a Georgian Revival manor in Southern Ontario, Canada, the owners of the property approached Toronto-based architecture studio Partisans to replace the structure with something far more adventurous. “Our clients had to run out and literally watched the cottage burn down,” Partisans’ co-founder Alex Josephson said at the time. “They were inspired to replace it with an innovative work of architecture that would be a nature-orientated escape to share with immediate family and friends.”

Havana-based designer Jorge Luis Veliz Quintana of creative studio Veliz Arquitecto has envisaged an imaginative refuge in the rugged mountains of Cuba. Boasting breathtaking views across the digitally replicated landscape, the ‘Cabins on the Mountain’ are designed to be camouflaged among the age-old boulders and towering trees.

The Shiroiya Hotel in Maebashi, Japan, occupies the site of a former ryokan – a type of Japanese inn – that hosted guests from all corners of the globe for more than 300 years. “The Shiroiya Ryokan had been in operation since the Edo Period, but it sadly had to close, leaving the building vacant,” says architect Sou Fujimoto, who began working on the project when his client, a Maebashi native, purchased the uninhabited edifice.

Architect Eduard Eremchuk and designer Katy Pititskaya say they borrowed inspiration from the three-part essence of locally made doughnuts – their airy shapes, melting glaze and cream – to envision an “unusual, slightly crazy and unreal” cafe in Voronezh, Russia.