The Block judge Darren Palmer's Bondi Beach home for sale
Darren Palmer, it can be said, is at the top of his game. As a judge on TV’s renovating juggernaut The Block and a best-selling author with an eponymous homewares collection, the adept renovator is one of Australia’s most renowned interior designers.
Yet when taking the reins of his most recent and arguably most ambitious renewal project – this time for his own house – there were equal parts thrill and trepidation.
“There was definitely pressure,” concedes Palmer. “Oh my God, yes! I judge people’s renovations for a living,” he adds with a laugh. “The expectations of others are high, but my expectations of myself are higher. I’m my harshest critic.”
It may well be this mentality that propels Palmer to channel his creative energies into each renovation. One that, as the unveiling of his latest work reveals, has produced an inspired outcome.
In a leafy street in Sydney’s Bondi, just 400 metres from Australia’s most iconic beach, the designer’s dramatically envisaged four-bedroom, four-bathroom abode is now on the market.
It’s difficult to imagine that this contemporary three-level showstopper began life a century ago as a single-level Californian bungalow. Over the decades, the home underwent numerous updates and extensions, including a second-level addition in 2010. All before, that is, the time of its most significant metamorphosis – under the tutelage of Palmer and his husband Olivier Duvillard, who share the home with their teenage son, Frankie the French bulldog and Ziz the Brussels griffon.
“In our renovation, we’ve undone a lot of the things that were done in the earlier ones,” says Palmer, “It was a bit of a Frankenstein’s monster of a house beforehand, in the way it was added to and added to and changed. There were lots of small closed rooms, a lack of availability to natural light, and lots of wasted space.”
Palmer and Duvillard, a cosmetic industry expert, snapped up the diamond in the rough in 2015. They were unfazed by the home’s shortcomings.
“We both walked in and said ‘Yes, this is the one’,” Palmer recalls. “We’re amongst bamboo and palm trees, so it feels like you’re somewhere else tranquil and tropical. But the poor old house had a lot to be improved upon. I spent years imagining what it might be when it was completely done.”
In 2022, Palmer collaborated with architect John Deuchrass and construction company Taste Living and began rebuilding much of the existing property.
“We retained one bedroom with the original 1920s horsehair plaster ornate ceiling. That room is like a little time capsule, but it’s also very contemporary, with all of the amenities you’d expect,” Palmer says.
Over a two-year duration, what was once a light-deprived, “higgledy-piggledy” house was transformed into a luminous entertainer’s abode offering dual indoor living spaces – winter and summer rooms – along with a heated pool and four lushly landscaped garden zones alive with subtropical foliage.
Working his magic on the interiors, Palmer was in his element.
“Every detail, every finish, everything that you see here, was a decision made by me and run past my husband,” he says.
All the while, Palmer was filming two concurrent seasons of The Block, including this year’s Block Island in Victoria’s Phillip Island.
“I see so many houses on The Block,” he muses, “And they’re really impressive. The time frames the contestants work in are just mind-blowing. It made me envious, that’s for sure! It also made me very compassionate and empathetic, because I was also going through it. I would dust off some clothes, travel to Victoria to film, and then come back to a job site.”
It may have been an exhaustive undertaking, but the result is precisely as Palmer envisaged: a glamorous yet serene oasis unified by soft sandy hues reflecting the coastal exterior. Unveiled at every turn are harmonious shifts of organic tone and texture – thoughtfully detailed earthy finishes, most notable being the sublime pink-tinged Monreale marble showcased throughout.
“Everything has tactility to it, but it’s a play on a monochromatic tonal palette,” says Palmer. “I would like to think that I don’t repeat myself, and that what I do is dependent on the location. This is definitely the right house for this place. It’s a luxury home, and a coastal home, with lots of attention to detail. And every space in the home has a purpose.”
Joyfully, too, in the early hours when the street is quiet, the echo of crashing waves is audible. “It’s heaven,” says Palmer.
For the design guru and his family, however, the next instalment beckons in their home – and, most likely, renovation – story. And, once again, there will be no looking back.
“This is the longest both my husband and I have lived in any home as adults,” reflects Palmer. “We’ve realised every dream and every potential for this property. Now that we’ve done that, it’s time to move on. I hope the next owners feel exactly as we do about the home – that they find it a tranquil, peaceful, big family home with so many spaces to gather and have joyful moments.”
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