Part house, part art gallery. That’s the premise behind JARtB House, architect Billy Kavellaris’ family home on a tree-lined street with an eclectic mix of housing typologies in Melbourne, Australia.
Completed in 2020, JARtB House is an acronym for all the members of his family—Jorja, Alexia, Rosalba, and Billy. “The T makes up the ‘art’ in the name of the house,” he says. He designed and filled the 1,500-square-foot residence with more than 30 works of art—sculpture, paintings, poetry, photography, and large-scale installations alike—made by him and other artists all over the globe.
“Some of the works are my own and the others have been commissioned from artists all over the world—Spain, Belgium, Philippines, Austria, Indonesia, Mexico, and Australia,” Billy says.
From the moment you pull up to the house you’re struck by its grandiose nature. “The house is a contemporary narration of Baroque ideas, and the entry was always an important experiential moment in a building,” Billy says. “Baroque architecture was a fusion of all the arts, sculpture, painting, and it challenged the traditional propositions of the symmetry of classical architecture.”
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- “The front entry engages and reinterprets the values. Grand, visually static, bold, ostentatious, and above all theatrical,” Bill says. Photo by Peter Bennetts
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- The staircase is made of 8-millimeter blackened steel with timber treads, as Billy wanted to emphasize what he calls ostentatious ornamentation. “The staircase was always an important design element, which was manifested as a piece of sculpture,” he says. Photo by Peter Bennetts
Billy started Kavellaris Urban Design, or KUD, in 2002. He says the firm focuses on delivering conscientious environmental design with clever, surprising, and smart architecture. “We are interested in architecture as an intellectual and philosophical construct founded on ideas that are materialized and translated into an architectural language,” he says.
He says people in the 21st century seem to have forgotten that art and architecture are the same discipline, but JARtB House seeks to remind them of that. “As an artist, photographer, poet, and architect I wanted our family home to reflect our cultural and aspirational values and live inside art.”
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- “Art has been used to connect space and volume as well as can be seen with the giraffes in the double height space,” Billy says. The Boca Do Lobo dining table was made using custom blue hand-painted tiles from Portugal. Photo by Peter Bennetts
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- Billy says JARtB House’s bathroom was inspired by the fusion and tension of natural and manmade materials, with an emphasis on drama and ornamentation. Tapware in the bathroom comes from Fantini Rubinetti. Photo by Peter Bennetts
You’ll discover Billy’s own works of art at the house from the moment you reach the front entry, where you’ll encounter his “Decorated Duck” sculpture. At the end of the property is Billy’s “Surrender,” a bluestone layered sculpture. He’s also the artist behind “Red Column” (seen in the basement), “Lights On” (the light installation on the basement ceiling), and “Simbla” and “Koumbo,” the giraffes named after his oldest daughter’s imaginary friends when she was a toddler.
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- Natural stone from G-Lux can be seen in the kitchen, master ensuite, bathrooms, laundry, and power room in various shades. Appliances by Gaggenau. Timber floor and ceiling boards by Made by Storey. Photo by Peter Bennetts
Billy, who has also taught architecture at the University of Melbourne, says he’s not simply an artist or a designer. He works across mediums. “I produce poetry, sculpture, photography, and architecture. They are all sharing stories and culture through different mediums, but ultimately they do the same thing.”
A version of this article originally appeared in Sixtysix Issue 05 with the headline “Livable Art.” Subscribe today.
