Mediterranean-inspired Carwoola estate with breathtaking gardens on the market

Every now and then along comes a home and garden where the superlatives run dry and you’re simply left in awe.

Affectionately named Tour Rouge is a Mediterranean-inspired Carwoola estate with one of the most amazing gardens in the region.

This unrivalled home and its imaginatively landscaped grounds are set on a 1.21-hectare hideaway in the tightly held Weetalabah Estate, just minutes from Queanbeyan.

Incredibly, this project was taken on by owners Rob and Danice Duffield as they moved into retirement 20 years ago. Danice says extensive European travel provided the inspiration.

“We travelled most years and often made gardens a focus of our trips,” she says, with key ideas incorporated into the gardens of Tour Rouge.

Danice says the couple designed the house and then engaged a builder. This expansive property now offers four bedrooms and three bathrooms with large formal and informal living areas.

The home features a new French-provincial-style kitchen with black granite benchtops and is fitted with quality Miele appliances including two ovens, integrated fridges and a freezer.

The island bench overlooks a dining and living area with a gas log fire, floor-to-ceiling windows and views over the terrace to the gardens.

The master bedroom features an en suite and walk-in robe with, again, floor-to-ceiling windows.

There’s a separate TV room on the way to two further king-size bedrooms serviced by a family bathroom.

A study completes the home, and internal access leads to a double garage with an adjoining workshop. But outside there is more – much more.

“We built everything else ourselves,” Danice says. “Our first project, the pump house, confirmed we could put down footings, lay bricks, render walls, build roof trusses and tile a roof.”

After that success, the couple built terraces, retaining walls, a columned arbour, an archway and sunken garden, a courtyard, loggia, and a two-storey bell tower.

The detached loggia (Italian for “lodge”) is fitted with a barbecue, wood-fired pizza oven and open fireplace and is the ideal entertaining space.

A separate guest pavilion with en suite bathroom and walk-in robe overlooks a solar-heated in-ground pool and travertine terrace. A Tuscan-inspired bell tower offers sweeping views of the pool, gardens, olive grove and distant hills.

“The gardens began with three very long pieces of string with which we marked the main axes,” Danice says. “We defined them with rows of trees including Manchurian pears, Italian pencil pines and flowering cherries.”

The gardens grew to include a wisteria arbour, a sunken garden and an olive grove.

Selling agent Ryan Broadhurst of Belle Property Queanbeyan rates Tour Rouge as one of the best properties he has ever represented.

“I’ve been getting strong interest from overseas, interstate and locally,” he says.

“A lot of people having been coming through Tour Rouge and it has left many speechless with wonder.”

Owners’ best

• Entertaining friends and family in all seasons, either in front of the open fire in the loggia in winter or around the pool in summer.
• Views of the garden from every room of the house and multiple locations where you can enjoy morning tea. Don’t miss the wisteria in spring.
• The feeling of being in Tuscany. Tour Rouge offers country living with city convenience, just five minutes to shops and 10 minutes to the airport.

Carwoola

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Price guide: $2.75 million-$3 million

Auction: 6pm, March 16

Agent: Belle Property Queanbeyan, Ryan Broadhurst 0417 513 896