Welcome to our weekly property digest, where we bring together the best homes for sale and rent across the world. This week, we have a converted Georgian dancehall in Edinburgh and a neo-brutalist home in Sydney among our discoveries.
Sacred Mountain House in New South Wales, Australia
4 bedrooms; 456 sqm; POA via Modern House
Celebrated Australian architect Peter Sutchbury celebrates the sun at this countryside home in New South Wales’ Hunter region. Sacred Mountain House is arranged like a giant architectural sundial with four wings wrapped around a grassy open courtyard. The house is orientated, so rooms capture the movement of the sun across the sky throughout the day. Get a bird’s eye view of the New South Wales property.
A converted 1850s dancehall in Edinburgh, Scotland
1 bedroom; 3,180 sq ft; £975,000 via The Modern House
A nine-ft-high cupola crowns this live/work space in Edinburgh city centre. The historic home dates from the 1850s when it was a dance hall and accommodation is set across three floors. The dramatic first-floor space of the Category B-listed building is a vast open-plan space with Georgian features and incredible acoustics. A light-filled apartment occupies the first floor, and the lower-ground floor is rented out as a commercial office offering potential income for the building’s future owner, or a convenient home business opportunity. Take an online tour.
Architect Elsye Alam’s Pasadena home, USA
3 bedrooms; 2,098 sq ft; $1.598m via Sotheby’s Realty International
Striking geometries rival mountain vistas across architect Elsye Alam’s award-winning Pasadena home. The Indonesia-born architect is the founder of firm ID-EA, and she designed the California property as her family home, filling it with elegant and practical details that heighten its unique setting. A 24-ft-long glass wall captures views towards Eagle Rock, Griffith Park and the San Gabriel mountains while a pair of 40-ft-high Himalayan cedar trees inspire the vertical cedar battens and fibre cement cladding that wrap the home. Peek inside.
A neo-brutalist home in Sydney, Australia
5 bedrooms; 500 sqm; POA via Ray White TRG
Soaring concrete volumes await inside this Sydney property which blends brutalist minimalism with loft-living. The Double Bay house unfurls across five levels set above and below ground, including a home office set beneath an outdoor swimming pool – complete with oculus bottom that peeks onto the studio below. Concrete juxtaposes American walnut cabinetry and furniture designed custom for the home softening its austere personality – explore it here.
The Shrill house in Portland, US
4 bedrooms; 1,650 sq ft; $639,000 via Premiere Property Group
Some readers will recognise this colourful midcentury home – it stars as the home of Annie’s parents in comedy television series Shrill. The 1959 Portland prefab property was designed by local architects Donald Blair and William Fletcher as a model home for developer Wedgwood Homes. Its timewarp interiors speak to the show’s fun, vintage vibe. Take an armchair tour.
