Bright Stars - Louise Olsen and Stephen Ormandy
Vogue Living Australia December 2009
Writer Betsy Brennan, Photographer Prue Ruscoe
YOU'VE CLIMBED THE umpteen steps to the front door, but you've come to the right house - a large, brilliant artwork by Gemma Smith leave no doubt. "We love that painting here because it creates a wonderful energy when you walk in," says Louise Olsen - artist, designer, Dinosaur Designs creator and living image of her Archibald portrait by David Bromley (which hangs upstairs, a generous gift from Bromley).
Daughter Camille is at school, but Skipper, the glossy dachshund, Quietly pets you and Olsen's husband. Stephen Ormandy - painter, designer and Dinosaur Designs creator - pads in on bare feet.
Airy, informal, open to the air currents, the Sydney beach house is so filled with light and greenery it hardly seems to interrupt the natural flow of the hill. It feels uncluttered, yet everywhere you look there is something to engage: a tiny painting by Olsen's mother. Valerie, a transparent cube of curious white objects, a suite of resin plates, a wall punctuated with irregular rectangles of glass.
"It was an old Federation house that was altered in the late '70s" says Olsen,"but it was very enclosed, very dark, not open to the aspect. We lived here for about nine years before we renovated, which gave us a chance to think about how we would like it to mnsform." The architect who worked the change was Sam Marshall. Married to Dinosaur Designs' third partner Liane Rossler (the three started the venture in the '80s when they were art students together), Marshall has
worked on other projects for the company. "We pretty much built the house from scratch,"says Ormandy."We wanted space and light."
"And breezes," adds Olsen. "This whole house opens up with big doors everywhere.When we walked up here we thought it had a great aspect. We see whales and dolphins. Steve grew up in Mosman and I grew up in Watsons Bay, so we've 'always loved being by the sea." The house is sited on a cross axis with the front facing north-east and the back facing south-west.
The garden, laid out by Richard Unsworth of Garden Life, focuses on natives: coastal plants hardy enough to sunvive the sea breezes at the front and, at the back, a glorious mass of native frangipani , bottlebrush, tea trees and huge bird's nest ferns that creates a private, tropical rainforest which stays lush with no watering.