The Brunswick Heads home built with rusty tin, recycled bricks and 100-year-old telegraph poles

• Who lives here: Jim Olivier and his son, Jack
• Type of property: New two-storey home built using recycled materials
• Address: 37 Nana Street, Brunswick Heads, NSW
• Price: $6 million

One of the great joys of using recycled materials in a residential build is the chance to layer a new home with multiple stories from the past. Sure, these materials contribute to a greener build, but for many homeowners, the real appeal lies in the inherent beauty of recycled timbers, bricks, windows and doors.

Retired legal headhunter Jim Olivier knew he wanted to work with old materials at his Brunswick Heads property.

After four years spent trying to work out how to transform the existing cottage into “a good house”, Olivier realised he’d have to start fresh. But he was determined to use as many recycled elements as possible in the new build.

Having successfully designed some smaller dwellings in the past, his vision for a two-storey home with a central, double-height void came easily.

“I really loved my career in recruitment, I had such a good time and I was so lucky,” he says. “But I never had the joy that I have with designing buildings. I just love it so much, sitting down with a pencil and a ruler.”

Olivier engaged Andrew Swain, a local builder with a reputation for creating artistic homes using recycled materials.

“I was very clear that I love the Australian vernacular, you know, a shed with rusty tin, chunky wood. And he was like, ‘Yes, this will be great fun!’” says Olivier. “He knew how to put recycled materials together. We didn’t even have definite decisions on what wall would have what materials, we just asked, ‘What feels right here?’”

Olivier visited salvage and recycling centres along the east coast and bought a wonderful assortment of recycled windows and doors including sash windows from grand old Melbourne homes, and 2.6-metre-high timber doors from France.

The home was constructed using hardwood timbers from Queensland and NSW bridges, and custom hardwood blackbutt flooring made from 100-year-old telegraph poles.

The recycled red bricks came from Sydney and the rustic tin cladding from the iconic Brunswick Picture House when it underwent a refurbishment. Antique tiles sourced from Spain and Morocco feature on landings and on the kitchen servery, where recycled stained glass windows fold away for easy transport of food to the covered deck.

The kitchen and dining zone has exposed brick walls, a slow-combustion fireplace and ceilings soaring to 7.5 metres, inspired by country sheds.

“I’ve always loved sheds,” Olivier declares. “I’ve always loved volume. Having high ceilings is a special quality in a house. The challenge was to have such a big space but keep it warm and hospitable, and I feel like with the materials and the lighting that we have, we’ve achieved that really well.”

A sunken lounge room with a second fireplace provides a cosy retreat with plenty of seating and built-in storage.

“We entertain out in the kitchen and out on the deck, but we always later end up in the lounge room with some records on,” says Olivier. “The lounge room is so warm and it does just kind of bed you in when you take a few steps down to the couch.”

There’s another sunken lounge on the back deck where Olivier loves to cook over an open fireplace installed in a supporting brick pier.

“I do enjoy sharing food with friends,” he says. “That fireplace outside was really built for cooking on as well as creating some ambience out on the deck.”

The deck leads out to a solar-heated pool bookended by a double garage.

Olivier shares the house with his son Jack, now seven, and so designed a split staircase climbing to two, upper-level wings. The master wing comes with a walk-in wardrobe, an office space with a built-in desk, balcony and en suite. On the other side of the void, the kids’ wing has two bedrooms or a bedroom plus a playroom, balcony and bathroom. In the bedroom, behind a nondescript wardrobe panel, a staircase leads to a secret loft, perfect for kids’ spy games.

Olivier says even newly complete, the house has history, its many parts a witness to many lives.

“I love this house,” he says. “I feel like I put so much into it, and it’s such a great house to live in. It just flows so well and there’s really nothing I would change. You walk into the house and it really does feel like it’s been here for a long time.”

SOLD - $4,700,000

37 Nana Street, Brunswick Heads NSW 2483

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