Like a fine tailored suit: Inside Simon Cohen’s new home

Buyer’s agent Simon Cohen is not too sure how much he spent tricking up his two-storey New York-style apartment in the inner-Sydney suburb of Potts Point, but it is close to $1.7m.

Simon Cohen. Picture: Dave Wheeler

Buyer’s agent Simon Cohen is not too sure how much he spent tricking up his two-storey New York-style apartment in the ritzy inner-Sydney suburb of Potts Point, but it is close to $1.7m. And he says he is there to stay – unless he gets married, and only then will he move deeper into Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs.

“After two years of renovations I lost track of how much I spent,” he says with a somewhat nonchalant air.

Cohen, the founder of buyer’s agency CohenHandler – a team of property experts on the east coast that has just expanded into South Australia – and star of a three-season reality TV show, has plumped for a brutalist style for the Macleay Street apartment.

He bought it for $5.125m two years ago and estimates it is now worth $10.7m after its renovation. But, he adds quickly, “I am not saying I would take that.”

The apartment has two levels and three terraces – one large enough to entertain 70 party guests. Another upstairs terrace has stunning west-facing views of the Sydney skyline, including those two old stalwarts, the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge.

“I would call this interior design bright and happy,” he says. “ When I bought this apartment it was like the ’90s gone wrong.”

It took years to renovate and Cohen, who grew up in the leafy Sydney suburb of St Ives, says at one stage he spent a month living in the Inter-Continental Hotel in Sydney as he had leased out his other Potts Point apartment in the nearby Gazebo during the renovation.

“I will never leave Potts Point, only if I got married and had kids,” he confesses. “I would move to Vaucluse, because I like the views and the beach.”

The Cohen residence in Potts Point. Pictures: Dave Wheeler

 

When Cohen purchased the three-bedroom apartment, he says it had a dark ’90s-style vibe. But thanks to the team of interior designer Joss Knight of Studiojos and Jack Freeman of Freeman Gallery, it is now light, bright and airy, with a distinct brutalist feel, and filled with bespoke furnishings sourced from all over the world.

Indeed, Cohen is so enamoured with the result that he has teamed up with Freeman to launch a new business, CohenFreeman.com, that offers turnkey interior design solutions for real estate buyers.

For Cohen’s apartment, Freeman wrapped many of the fittings in stitched white leather, including the staircase railing, which took 16 hours to hand wrap.

It’s now basically a one-bedroom apartment, with the remaining two bedrooms given over to Cohen’s other needs.

 

 

One of the bedrooms has been turned into a tailor’s room for Cohen’s clothes, complete with custom hangers, and unashamedly resembles a luxe boutique.

The third bedroom has been converted into a moody TV-style room where Cohen likes to chill on Sundays, relaxing for up to six hours at a time. It features a custom velvet lounge and has a definite upscale hotel vibe.

When it comes to the kitchen upstairs, Cohen says he doesn’t cook so all appliances were deliberately hidden from view.

The upstairs lounge room is adorned with Venetian plaster and there’s a silver champagne coloured silk rug underfoot.

 

 

“It’s masculine without being dark; cool and edgy,” says Cohen, who admits that in contrast to his renovation at the Gazebo, he did not hold back when it came to the fiscal outlay.

“I decided that if I am going to do it, do it properly,” he says. “Bizarrely, I decided to trust the process. I wanted it to look perfect.”

Joss Knight notes that Cohen is a buyers agent, not a sales man, “so his day-to-day look is elegant but relaxed and not too serious. The home had to match this.”

With strict instructions to keep it ultra light and airy, “we reinvented the feeling of masculine in subverting the traditional dark and moody bachelor pad using shades of grey, taupe and bronze, to give the home a warm feeling like a fine tailored suit,” Knight says.

“Hence when it came to materiality, there is a recurring use of saddle-stitched leather, woven metals, rich velvets, wool and suede.”

Jack Freeman, who looked after the furniture and art curation, says that when Cohen returned to his new Macleay Street apartment he had nothing more than a few carry-on suitcases.

“The home was styled, the fridge stocked, pantry filled, bedding steamed, fireplace lit, and champagne was on ice awaiting his arrival,” Freeman says.

“That was the lightbulb moment for both of us, when we realised, in the high-end market of new developments in Australia, why isn’t a service like this available?”