House of the week: Rare waterfront wonder

1 week ago 17

The home at 216 Casuarina Drive, Nightcliff. Picture: Supplied

A one-of-a-kind Darwin home facing the Nightcliff foreshore is on the market for the first time since it was built 40 years ago.

Architecturally designed by Steven Ehrlich and built by Tommy Valentine, the house sits on a 1740 sqm double block at 216 Casuarina Drive, Nightcliff, with 48.14m of coastal frontage and a pool.

The home has four-bedrooms, two bathrooms, a mezzanine with library, a joyful colour scheme and an eclectic mix of furniture collected across the years, which will remain with the property.

Steve Baddeley and his first wife Susan, who has sadly passed away, built the house and brought up four children in the home.

Mr Baddeley said he wanted an expansive, solid home that made use of the environment and the beach across the road.

“The build was meant to take six month but it took 13,” he said.

“It was fantastic when we finally moved in.

“I must admit we have a very long room – it’s the length of a cricket pitch – and walking back and forth to the kitchen from the bedroom when we first moved in, my wife and I got very sore feet.”

The home is being sold with furniture included. Picture: Supplied

A cathedral-style living space runs almost the length of the house. Picture: Supplied

In a recent interview, architect Steven Ehrlich said the challenge with the home was designing a tropical house using reinforced concrete.

“To take advantage of the site and the breezes and being blockwork walls, we decided we would put a big veranda around the house to shade the walls and keep the sun off the walls,” he said.

“And then essentially, what we’ve done is ventilate the roof space, which you can see through the timber louvres in the walls and the ridge vent.

“The eaves are actually open and when the sun heats up the air between the ceiling and the roof space, hot air rises and so it rises through the central roof vent and draws in cool air.”

The home has double doors opening into a formal entryway, which sits in a cathedral-style living space the runs the length of the home with exposed rafters, roof vent and timber louvres high up on the walls.

Running off one end of this space is a kitchen, laundry, bathroom and dining room.

At the other end of the home there are three bedrooms with built-in robes and a master suite with ensuite.

The mezzanine features a library. Picture: Supplied

Bold colours feature throughout the home. Picture: Supplied

Above the bedrooms, a mezzanine level with full-height bookcases opens to a big balcony and views over the pool and the Nightcliff foreshore.

The home has expansive verandas, landscaped tropical gardens, mature trees and plenty of lawns.

Mr Baddeley said the home was once “flesh-coloured” by recently received a bright makeover.

“My second wife, Dominique, and I were in Vietnam early last year,” he said.

“We were in Hanoi and we saw an old French colonial building and it was painted this (golden) colour and I said that’s the colour we need to pain home.

“I’m a great believer in light and colour impacting your psyche.

“When we have breakfast sitting around the side of the house, it just changes our mood.

“You look at the sun on the (house) colour and the greenery from the garden and it makes you happy.”

Mr Baddeley said developing the gardens had also been an “act of love and interest”.

“I built a thing called a ‘folly’,” he said.

“It’s a very English thing to have a folly, which is meant to look like a ruin.

“Mine is probably the only purpose-built built ruin in Darwin.”

The veranda wraps around the house. Picture: Supplied

The home exterior has been painted in ‘Golden Orb’. Picture: Supplied

Mr Baddeley said some of his fondest memories in the Casuarina Drive home involved his family and entertaining.

“For many years, starting in, I think, 2002, we’ve had a lunch for all my friends here, about 40 of them on long trestle tables down the main room,” he said.

“We also enjoy watching the storms and the clouds and the weather.

“We watch the ships going out and the very occasional crocodile.

“One episode I can remember clearly – a few years ago as the sun was setting a dolphin or a porpoise started to leap up in the air in the rays of the setting sun, and it did it over and over about 20 times.”

Mr Baddeley said he enjoyed having a front-row seat to the Nightcliff foreshore.

“People watching is one of the great pastimes we don’t appreciate enough,” he said.

“We sit out in the garden having breakfast and we look at the people walking and cycling past.

“People dance on the dance floor that used to belong to old hotel, people come have parties, people get married there, my own daughter got married across the road.”