Set to holiday mode in this ultimate entertainer’s retreat
Step inside this flawless holiday house guaranteed to win over family and friends
2 min
For sun seekers in search of the ideal holiday home, there’s always compromises to be made. The location might not be perfect, the house may be in need of work or it could be just too far from the closest capital city to make regular use viable.
Not with this elevated beachfront property on the NSW Central Coast.
The two-storey residence at 46 Kalakau Avenue, Forresters Beach is the kind of place guaranteed to make its owners popular among family and friends. With five bedrooms (and a possible sixth) as well as multiple living areas across two floors and two spacious, well-appointed kitchens to service each level, this is a house built for entertaining.
The floorplan has been carefully crafted for easy cross ventilation and natural light to capture the best of its beachside position with the addition of ducted aircon and a built-in fireplace to ensure the house is comfortable all year round.
Close attention has been paid to circulation between spaces while also providing opportunities for separation – a key advantage when guests come to stay. The predominantly white interior scheme is a perfect match for the seaside locale, offering the perfect ‘canvas’ for putting your own design stamp.
But while the accommodation is generous, it’s the location that really hits the mark with uninterrupted, never-to-be-built-out views of pristine Forresters Beach to enjoy from the spacious entertaining area on the ground floor and the balconies above.
The property has direct access through reserves to the beach via a set of stairs, the definition of luxury in a modern world. On those days when you’d prefer to stay at home, a private pool and spa is the perfect respite.
For Sydneysiders, it’s less than 90 minutes from the CBD, making weekend getaways an easy option. With a three-car garage on site, there’s room for everyone.
Address: 46 Kalakau Avenue, Forresters Beach
Next inspection: Saturday October 7, 11am-11.30am
Agent: Cathy Baker, Belle Property Central Coast 0414 241 005
Consumers are going to gravitate toward applications powered by the buzzy new technology, analyst Michael Wolf predicts
Chris Dixon, a partner who led the charge, says he has a ‘very long-term horizon’
A new AI-driven account by leading landscape architect Jon Hazelwood pushes the boundaries on the role of ‘complex nature’ in the future of our cities
2 min
Drifts of ground cover plants and wildflowers along the steps of the Sydney Opera House, traffic obscured by meadow-like planting and kangaroos pausing on city streets.
This is the way our cities could be, as imagined by landscape architect Jon Hazelwood, principal at multi-disciplinary architectural firm Hassell. He has been exploring the possibilities of rewilding urban spaces using AI for his Instagram account, Naturopolis_ai with visually arresting outcomes.
“It took me a few weeks to get interesting results,” he said. “I really like the ephemeral nature of the images — you will never see it again and none of those plants are real.
“The AI engine makes an approximation of a grevillea.”
Hazelwood chose some of the most iconic locations in Australia, including the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, as well as international cities such as Paris and London, to demonstrate the impact of untamed green spaces on streetscapes, plazas and public space.
He said he hopes to provoke a conversation about the artificial separation between our cities and the broader environment, exploring ways to break down the barriers and promote biodiversity.
“A lot of the planning (for public spaces) is very limited,” Hazelwood said. “There are 110,000 species of plants in Australia and we probably use about 12 in our (public) planting schemes.
“Often it’s for practical reasons because they’re tough and drought tolerant — but it’s not the whole story.”
Hazelwood pointed to the work of UK landscape architect Prof Nigel Dunnett, who has championed wild garden design in urban spaces. He has drawn interest in recent years for his work transforming the brutalist apartment block at the Barbican in London into a meadow-like environment with diverse plantings of grasses and perennials.
Hazelwood said it is this kind of ‘complex nature’ that is required for cities to thrive into the future, but it can be hard to convince planners and developers of the benefits.
“We have been doing a lot of work on how we get complex nature because complexity of species drives biodiversity,” he said.
“But when we try to propose the space the questions are: how are we going to maintain it? Where is the lawn?
“A lot of our work is demonstrating you can get those things and still provide a complex environment.”
At the moment, Hassell together with the University of Melbourne is trialling options at the Hills Showground Metro Station in Sydney, where the remaining ground level planting has been replaced with more than 100 different species of plants and flowers to encourage diversity without the need for regular maintenance. But more needs to be done, Hazelwood said.
“It needs bottom-up change,” he said. ““There is work being done at government level around nature positive cities, but equally there needs to be changes in the range of plants that nurseries grow, and in the way our city landscapes are maintained and managed.”
And there’s no AI option for that.
Consumers are going to gravitate toward applications powered by the buzzy new technology, analyst Michael Wolf predicts
Chris Dixon, a partner who led the charge, says he has a ‘very long-term horizon’
