Hogg’s Hollow

Interior designer Kim Lambert has brought a European sensitivity to scale, proportion and materiality, weaving modern elegance into the framework of a classic North American family home. Lambert was guided by a palette of nuanced textures: smoked antique mirror, black-stained oak, hot-rolled steel, hand-trowelled venetian plaster and honed Calacatta stone. These materials layer to form a language that feels both grounded and expressive. Matte driftwood-stained floors and bespoke rugs quieten the base, allowing individual elements to breathe within the open plan.

“The home spans approximately 650 square metres (7,000 square feet) across four levels, and features five bedrooms, a golf simulator on the third floor and a guest suite on the lower level, which opens directly onto the back garden. Additional amenities include a wine room, a gym and a sauna – spaces designed for both retreat and recreation,” says Lambert. 

With a growing family of six at its centre, the home was conceived to support connection and rhythm. Lambert’s millwork is highly considered – architectural yet unobtrusive – while sculptural lighting defines atmosphere and movement throughout. Three Carousel pendants by Lee Broom animate the main hall, setting a tone that is playful yet composed. In the formal living room, a restrained material palette invites stillness, offset by a black marble bar tucked quietly to one side. The dining room is more theatrical: a dusky palette and concrete-textured walls set the stage for Gabriel Scott’s Kelly Chandelier, suspended above a generous round table surrounded by dusty rose velvet chairs.

The kitchen plays with contrast, where a sculptural island in leathered white Calacatta is set against cabinetry in blackened oak and hot-rolled steel. Above it hovers the Cloud pendant by Apparatus, a playful nod to levity in an otherwise quietly dramatic space. This language continues in the family room, where twin Montauk sofas bring balance and the Tube chandelier by Michael Anastassiades lends a final, architectural punctuation.

On the lower level, a softly lit wine room is clad in Venetian plaster, its entrance framed by quiet grey marble, giving way to a striking stone counter and niche. Apparatus’s Circuit pendant glows in a corner softened by moss green velvet seating. Loire limestone runs underfoot, lending a refined foundation to this subterranean retreat.

Upstairs, the primary bedroom evokes a Belgian-inspired stillness. Green tapestry wallpaper forms a gentle backdrop to the bed, and minimal nightstands are set across from a Venetian plaster-clad fireplace flanked by low seating – an intimate corner of repose and texture.

“The original warm walnut floors felt out of sync with the design language we were cultivating,” Lambert says of one of the design challenges. “Rather than replace them, we chose to bleach and re-stain the wood in a driftwood grey, aligning the floors with the home’s new aesthetic. We also removed a wall between the dining and family rooms to open up the flow and invite more connection to the back of the house.”

In this house each room is an evolution of the last, crafted with care, curiosity and an enduring sense of place.