‘I hate a sparse house’: Inside comedian Rhys Nicholson’s maximalist home

Comedian Rhys Nicholson was working on a cruise ship in the middle of the ocean when they bought their first home with their now-husband Kyran.

“There was almost no reception so I was just getting minimal texts through to Rhys and having to make gigantic decisions on behalf of us both,” recalls Kyran, a comedy director, podcaster and former Triple J presenter.

• Owners: Rhys and Kyran Nicholson
• Type of property: A modern two-storey townhouse
• Address: 82A Ross Street, Coburg, Victoria
• Price guide: $780,000-$850,000
• Auction: 11am, May 25

“I was literally leaning out – there was a certain bit of the boat where I got phone reception,” Rhys says. “Then at a certain point, I just got a text from him that said. ‘We got it.’”

The couple, who married at Sydney’s Enmore Theatre last September, bought the newly built, two-storey townhouse in Coburg, eight kilometres north of Melbourne’s CBD, in mid-2017.

Rhys and Kyran Nicholson bought their Coburg home in 2017. Credit: Natalie Jeffcott

Not a fan of its stark white walls, they threw caution to the wind when it came to appealing to future buyers (“They just want white on white on white, apparently,” Kyran says) and slowly made changes to inject their personalities into the home.

One of the key updates they made was to turn the small kitchen into a “sprawling” space, complete with green cabinetry, pink walls, textured tiles and three ovens.

“I cook and we like having people over for dinner and having small get-togethers, so it just wasn’t conducive to that,” Rhys says. “We had a couple of dinner parties there and it was just like, ‘We need to do something about this kitchen.’”

They also turned the upstairs bedroom, which was fast becoming a “junk room”, into a living area, painting the walls dark and adding a thick, soft carpet.

“We call it the soft room,” says Rhys, who is a judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under. ”If we have people over for dinner, usually we kind of gravitate into there after.”

The couple are now looking to split their time between Melbourne and Daylesford – they’ve just bought a ‘rundown weatherboard’ in the area.Credit: Natalie Jeffcott

Describing their interior style as maximalist, Rhys says the home is furnished with a “healthy mixture of functional pieces” and “absurd, stupid decorative things”.

This includes an “unbelievably heavy” petrified wood stump, plates with swear words imprinted, a miniature teapot made by Rhys’ dad, and a dark timber buffet – the first piece of furniture they bought together – with sentimental watermarks.

The couple’s art collection is also on display, including pieces by Sydney artist Katherine Brickman and a large poster print for the ’80s film Blue Velvet, passed down from Rhys’ father.

Tapestries of shears and a hacksaw hang above their bed, and a napkin scrawled with plans for Rhys’ wedding to fellow comedian Zoë Coombs Marr hangs framed in the hallway (the two ‘married’ in 2016 in protest of not being able to marry their partners).

The couple injected their personalities into the home, adding green cabinetry, pink walls, textured tiles and three ovens to the kitchen.Credit: Natalie Jeffcott

Several portraits of Rhys, including one by Melissa Ritchie, which was shortlisted in the 2016 Archibald Prize, and another by renowned photographer Gary Heery, can also be found around the home.

“I hate a sparse house,” Rhys says. “My parents are artists and I think I just grew up with a lot of stuff on the walls.”

The couple – who co-founded Melbourne theatre and bar Comedy Republic with former Triple J Breakfast host Alex Dyson in 2020 – have seen Coburg evolve since they moved there, but insist it hasn’t lost its charm.

“Seven or eight years ago when we moved here, there was not a coffee option, which sounds so Melbourne and bougie, but you’d have to drive to Brunswick to get something,” Rhys says.

“Now there are three options in walking distance,” Kyran adds, listing Joy, a new cafe on Gaffney Street, and burger joint 300 Grams as two of their go-tos.

Perhaps the most glaring sign of the area’s gentrification is the Palace Cinema (which they are members of) that opened at the Pentridge prison site in 2020. Established in 1851, the jail housed some of Victoria’s most notorious criminals before its closure in 1997.

Merri Creek is also a short stroll away, providing an idyllic spot for the couple to walk their dog – a Welsh springer spaniel named Hopkins (Hops for short) after Welsh actor Anthony Hopkins.

While they enjoy getting out and about in the local area, Sundays are often spent pottering around at home – cleaning, weeding the front garden, and cooking.

‘I hate a sparse house,’ Rhys says. ‘My parents are artists and I think I just grew up with a lot of stuff on the walls.’ Credit: Natalie Jeffcott

“If I’ve got a Sunday night off, I will almost always do a roast of some sort, whether it’s just the two of us or with other people, and that’s genuinely important to me,” Rhys says.

Kyran adds: “You can be sitting at the dining table and chatting with whoever’s cooking as the sun sets. That’s probably one of my favourite moments of the day.”

Looking for more space, Rhys and Kyran recently bought a “rundown weatherboard” in Daylesford, with plans to buy a pied-à-terre – a little apartment in the city – and split their time between the two.

They’ve just listed their Coburg home for sale and are in the process of fixing up their Daylesford house, which Kyran says “needs a lot of work”.

“It’s been neglected for far too long,” he says. “Some of the weatherboards that are on the side, you can literally fold up; they fell off when I touched them.” To which Rhys jokes, “The words ‘money pit’ keep getting thrown around.”

This article was originally published by Domain.com.au. Reproduced with permission.