Home interiors post WW2 were featured prominently in Women’s magazines and designed by architects. Displayed in department stores, the plan services in Victoria and then NSW (although it had a service in the 1920s that closed), helped kick off the post-war boom in building and interiors, with Australians possessing a desire to create something new, and something to respond to our unique landscape and light.

With many previous homes built in the image of England or Europe, kitchens were often internal rooms, houses faced the wrong aspect, ventilation wasn’t prioritised and cooling/heating was coal, fire or gas driven.

The NSW Small Homes Service in 1953 preceded Sun-Line Homes in 1958, and then Pettit & Sevitt in 1961. The long, low lines of the now-iconic Beachcomber by Nino Sydney for Lend Lease also arrived around 1962, as well a number of house formats you might recognise around Sydney and beyond.

You may own such a house from the many house plans available at the time! We always encourage people to find out a bit about their house if they can, before renovation. I’ve been emailed and approached about everything from doorhandles to cedar finishes, and truthfully, it’s impossible to know what approach to take if you don’t understand the DNA of your home. It’s not necessary to live in a museum or an ode to the 50s, in fact – it’s impractical for many people to emulate that time, the objects, the fabrics or the lifestyle. But, painting everything white may not be your best solution either. So, find out everything you can and start there. Look at your site, talk to a good designer or architect if you’re having alterations and additions, consider improvements that are sensitive to the inherent style you have. If you have a cottage, don’t try to make it a Split Level. If you have a Split Level, don’t try to make it a ‘Hampton’s house’ …whatever that means. We do have our own beaches and there are coastal styles found in Palm Beach which are weatherboard on stone foundations. Find the equivalent of what you have, rather than trying to something into what it is not. Not only will you avoid destroying the architecture you’ve bought, you’ll save a lot of time and money. It’s always mystifying as to why the ‘Hamptons’ name and trend has taken hold here.

I know some people own ‘Sydney style’ homes – a style that came later in the 1960s and 70s – and they simply don’t like the brick or don’t like parts of the house, or worse, know nothing about them. Again, exposed clinker brick has its merits but it is best to try to understand it in the context of your house and site, before rendering it to oblivion (RIP). Likewise, there are ways of gently improving features without painting over, or choosing the latest trend in ‘greige’ toned tiles to before realising, after an expensive renovation, it just belong. Greige might be fine if your house is all straight lines, minimalist and tonal in greys, and could be fantastic for apartments… but using it to erase natural timbers, or bland-out walls, beams and floors can cause a regret that is too late, and too expensive to undo.

Read about The Small Homes Service

Images: (c) Museum of Sydney

Here’s a great article about the Small Homes Service by Dr Noni Boyd.