A backyard designed around how you actually use it

Most backyards are a lawn with furniture on it. This one started with a list of what the family actually did outside — long dinners, one person cooking while everyone else hovered, kids on grass, winter evenings by a fire — and worked backwards from there.

The result is five zones on one level change. No pool, no water feature, nothing that needs a service contract.

Sink the lounge, not the budget

Dropping the firepit lounge 450mm below the terrace does three things: it creates shelter from wind, it turns the retaining wall into seating, and it gives the space a sense of arrival without a single extra material. The firepit is a plain limestone block with a linear gas burner. That's all it needs.

The kitchen faces the table

The outdoor kitchen is a straight run in blackened steel with a stone bench. It sits perpendicular to the dining table so whoever's cooking is part of the conversation, not off to one side. Storage lives underneath, behind flush doors — firewood, cushions, the things that normally end up in the garage.

“A backyard doesn't need more features. It needs fewer, better-placed ones.”

Leave the lawn alone

The temptation is to fill every metre. Don't. A clean rectangle of grass, edged in stone, framed by olives and rosemary, is doing more work than any additional structure would. It's the negative space that lets the rest read.