Hamptons Estate

Design concept

The brief

Room to breathe.

Hamptons Estate is an architect-designed concept for a large rural property at Darkes Forest in the Southern Highlands. The brief was to create a home with the scale and grace of a Hamptons-style estate — generous proportions, wide verandahs, and a strong connection between the house and the surrounding land.

The plan centres on a sequence of indoor and outdoor living spaces: a covered alfresco that wraps around the rear, an outdoor dining area shaded by a pergola, and a fire pit terrace that anchors the southern lawn. The kitchen and main living open directly to the alfresco through large bi-fold doors.

This is a home designed for people who want to live differently — not squeezed onto a suburban block, but with room to move, to entertain, and to breathe.

Design story

The estate ideal.

Hamptons architecture works in Australia because it shares the same DNA: weatherboards, pitched roofs, wide verandahs, and an easy relationship between indoors and out. At Darkes Forest, we pushed that language into something grander — an estate rather than a house.

The aerial view tells the story best: the building sits confidently in its landscape, the outdoor rooms extending the living area well beyond the walls. The fire pit, the alfresco, the covered dining — each is a room in its own right.