David Hicks remembers the first home he designed fondly: his own, in the gritty-chic Melbourne suburb of Prahran in the late 1990s. A rectangular white box with a glossy black floor, the tiny flat was “just big enough” for him and a part-time staffer to establish what is today one of Australia’s most esteemed interior design studios.

“My assistant would answer the phone, on a fixed line of course, and cover the mouthpiece with a hand while whispering the name of the person calling,” he laughs at the memory. “If I nodded, they’d say in a rather posh voice, ‘Hold please, putting you through now.’ ”