There's something wonderfully full circle about the firm that designed the very first home Never Too Small featured, Microluxe, three years later being responsible for the design of our studio, NTS Space.
Architects Ben Edwards and Nancy Beka have a history of combining creative thinking with simple materials to create useful, transformable homes that reflect the owners' personalities, and meet their needs. For Never Too Small, this meant a studio that encouraged collaboration and flexibility, yet offered focus areas and privacy when required, and provided a beautiful space that inspired us to create while also, in turn, allowing us to showcase some of our favourite artists and designers.
There are so many converted warehouses in Collingwood, an inner suburb of Melbourne with an industrial past. Most of these warehouses have been converted over the past few decades, servicing many of Melbourne's creative, design, and architectural firms. As is so often the case with warehouse conversions, high ceilings and larges spaces provide great opportunities for open plan work, plenty of light and airflow create environments conducive to high-performing creative environments. We did, however, have unique requirements that the architects needed to puzzle through, for example at times our editors needed darker spaces, our producers needed quieter rooms for voice recording and interviewing architects, while our marketing team at times needed privacy for commercial discussions with potential brand partners.
Ben and Nancy didn't want to close off the beautiful large space with a bunch of walls though (and we agreed!) and by way of that insight, settled on a flexible pod design, four to be exact that would house various functions of NTS.
The pods are constructed of only 4 materials, steel, recycled OSB Panels that make up the walls, acoustic panels (in the ceiling to reduce the amount of sound bouncing off the roof), and the desks. In three pods the OSB panels have all been painted white to increase the amplification of natural light, with one pod (the podcast pod) unpainted to 'break with the idea that everything has to be the same'.
While the room has been designed around the flow of natural light, nighttime brings a warm ambience to the space, and social events or late nights spent adding the final touches to an edit sees the strategically placed (on the Pod cross beams) smart LED lights provide a gentle ambience to the studio. The light source is closer and becomes more focused, cosier and adjusted to the mood of the evening. We're a close-nit team here at Never Too Small, and a drink and laugh are never far away, made even more delightful under the colourful glow of our pods.
Of course, like many of the designers we feature, we don't love bare walls so our walls and shelves are a constantly changing gallery of some of our favourite artists from Collingwood and neighbouring suburbs. You can check out some of the pieces in more detail on our Instagram.
