Search
Back to Top
Above his Melbourne shop, Ben Mooney’s 60sqm/646sqft apartment is part home, part archive – where antiques, both real and faux, are curated in a fresh, unfussy way that makes the old feel new again.
“It’s good to have a little bit of a sense of humour in a space.”
“I like to find pieces that can go anywhere – a hall table, a bedside table, whatever.”
“Obviously everyone loves to have space, but you can create intimacy and romance in a smaller space.”
If there’s one thing to know about Ben Mooney, it’s that he loves antiques – and also “antiques”. Highlights from his personal collection include the Mona Lisa, a fibreglass Apollo bust he found on Marketplace for fifty dollars, and a large freestanding, ancient-looking column that occupies a corner of his living room. “It’s really funny because it’s plastic and I think everyone thinks it’s made out of solid stone. It’s from a prop hire place,” Mooney says.
Ma House Supply Store is Mooney’s business in Melbourne, where he sells antiques and new wares by local designers. Before opening his store, Mooney spent seven years working in skip hire. “I’d always loved decorating my home,” he says, “but there are only so many times you can change the furniture around. I started the shop because I knew I couldn’t keep buying things and putting them in the house.” The store became a natural extension of his home life – a way to keep curating, reshuffling, and sharing his finds with others. The 60sqm/646sqft apartment above the shop is accessed beyond a gold rope at the bottom of some stairs in the store. It holds a fascinating curation of Georgian and Victorian antiques, family heirlooms (his own and other people’s), collections of objects (including a wonderfully quirky assortment of cigarette dispensers), and lucky finds from Marketplace. His space combines antiques with modern materials, and it all works together – a testament to his eye for curation and his belief that living beautifully has little to do with newness.
“I haven’t always asked for permission to do things, but I’ve never gotten in trouble either,” Mooney says of his commercial lease for the property. “If you do the work properly, it’s really adding value to the place.” Making the apartment his own was a feat of creativity and patience. In the living room, he painstakingly chipped away years of paint on the walls to reveal the warm texture beneath. “The best part about it is you really don’t know what you’re going to get,” he says. “There’s no way to kind of control the colour that’s coming through.” He removed the wall between the two largest rooms and installed a structural beam clad in timber shelving. “There was the option of plaster but this gave me more display space, which is something that I obviously need,” he adds. To bring in even more light, Mooney also removed most of the doors leading from the entryway landing into the rooms (a renter-friendly hack). By eliminating the swing back of the doors, he regained valuable space, gained line of sight between rooms, and brought light flooding into the landing. Beyond the kitchen, a small potted courtyard garden provides a rare pocket of greenery in the city. Between customers, he often slips outside with his greyhound, Goody, to enjoy the sunshine. “It’s probably my favourite part of the place,” Mooney says. “It’s where I get my little bit of nature and can relax at the end of the day.”
Before IKEA’s flatpack furniture, there were Victorian breakfront wardrobes – one of which takes up residence in Mooney’s bedroom. It comes apart easily into three sections by lifting the top panel. As he explains, Victorian furniture simply “makes sense for Victorian buildings because they were designed at the same time as the building, so being able to separate it into different pieces means you could get it up the stairs or a narrow hallway.” Mooney uses it as his main wardrobe storage in the bedroom.
Another showstopping piece is the antique daybed in the living area that he found at Nord in Melbourne. His first “big boy purchase,” Mooney likes that it works as an additional lounge piece and is also ready for sleeping in without any fuss. He used it a lot during his renovation when the bedroom wasn’t available, although he still recommends avoiding living in a renovation if possible. “I know that I own a lot of objects, but they’re all clean and they’re all dust-free, and when you’re doing a renovation, that is not how life is,” he adds.
From daybeds to Marketplace cabinets, Mooney’s taste for the pre-loved continues in the kitchen, where a vintage bench, large shelf, and sink unit were all purchased from Marketplace for 200 dollars. The kitchen shelves, almost overflowing with an array of vintage kitchenware, double as a prop library for photo shoots. Mooney often hires out his home as a location for creative projects and editorials. He keeps appliances to a minimum – no bulky coffee machines here. “Instead of having a huge coffee machine, it’s better to have twelve stove-top ones,” he laughs.
Mooney says, “It’s good to have a little bit of a sense of humour in a space.” But his home is so much more than that. It tells a story of sentiment and curation. His instinct for display and his affection for the imperfect give the space its warmth and personality. His advice on balancing quality and affordability is simple – buy secondhand and buy what you love. “You just have to find what you love and what speaks to you and what you love will go naturally together, hopefully!” Mooney says with a grin.
