More than four years since I featured work by interior designer Nicole Hollis and her studio? I need to rectify that! Two projects. Two styles. One sophisticated and modern in black and white. The other a playful colour riot, a tongue in cheek take on San Francisco icons for a boutique hotel fitout. The first seriously sleek and sexy, the other seriously fun (that’s Jack Kerouac’s  On the Road as wallpaper).

Cool bookcase from Brooklyn based architects and designers Workstead. A ladder that reaches to an operable skylight forms part of the bookcase structure.

This family beach house in Onemana, New Zealand was a student project for 16 third-year architectural students, known collectively as Studio 19, at Unitec, overseen by Dave Strachan of Strachan Group Architects and Marshall Cook of Cook Sargisson & Pirie. The bach is home to four (mum, dada and 2 girls) and provides master bedroom, bunkroom, bathroom, kitchen, living and dining as well as decks to extend the living spaces outwards. It’s not elaborate or pretentious but harks back to the days of simple family holidays while still being stylish on a low budget. The bach was built on campus forming part of the end-of-year grad show before being transported to its final site.

It is sooooooo hot in my part of the world at the moment. Most of the country is experiencing a heatwave. Day after day of unrelenting high temperatures, the threat of bushfires and smoke curling into everything. Oh to be sitting at the table in this house, a large pitcher of iced tea making rings on the wood, waiting for the sea breeze to roll in and annoy the pages of the Saturday papers spread in disarray before me. In my fantasy the fire of course is not lit! What a lovely beachy home perched above the trees. Books, vintage furniture and tapa cloth. Perfect. What a great way to start the real estate stalking year. Link here while it lasts.

Take me away to a land of snow, a land of steep mountains and tumbling valleys. I want to hide away from the world in a wooden house clinging to the slopes in an age-old hamlet. Annalisa and Peter Zumthor’s timber houses perch above their age blackened neighbours in Leis in Val, Switzerland (population 20). Once inside the houses wrap you in their close embrace, while classic midcentury and modern furniture plays against the soft golden gleam of the wooden walls. But turn outwards, look through those windows and a wonderland awaits, winter or summer. Zumthor Ferienhäuser – holiday homes to rent.