Designer Andrew Hays reveals his favourite Italian restaurants
Architect Andrew Hays’s quest to renovate a crumbling Italian palazzo has led him to one of the country’s dining hot spots.
After early beginnings as a set and costume designer, Andrew Hays now runs London architecture firm ARTEIM with partner and fellow NIDA alumni Kimm Kovac. Kitchen marble inlays may be a departure from the stage, but Hays sees his diversified career as a continuum. “Opera and theatre design still informs my strong use of colour and texture, nostalgic references and sense of narrative,” he says.
Hays credits his design training at Sydney NIDA with forging his vision. “We learned how to immerse ourselves in a project, test ideas, and develop an entire opera production under pressure. It was an amazing foundation.”
Starting out, small theatres couldn’t afford big scenery changes, yet Hays remembers early budget constraints fondly. “You have to become more metaphorical, and get creative with lighting. Storytelling on a shoestring can be quite magical.”
As well as working with the Belvoir St Theatre and Sydney Theatre Company, Hays designed two opera productions on Sydney Opera House’s main stage. “Opera is the most exciting part of set design: you create a visual picture as an emotional response to the power of sound, in harmony with it. The earlier the opera, the less notes in the libretto and the more of a blank slate you have.”
He moved overseas in 2008 to design opera productions in the US and Britain. When the financial crisis hit, Hays switched to architecture. “Any creative journey involves living in a world that doesn’t exist yet: you are trying to get people to believe it long before it’s there.”
Our palazzo passion
Kimm and I have been renovating this incredible 400-year-old palazzo in Northern Italy’s Piedmont region. My mum has ancestral roots there, and while visiting family and friends we fell in love with the undulating vineyards, valleys. We searched high and low for a historic property that retained architectural integrity and hadn’t been badly restored, and found one that had belonged to a noble family. It was overgrown but the walls were still painted and untouched, the roof and even the bathtub were original. It gave us an amazing canvas.
Al dente dining
Our region in Piedmont has an incredible 75 Michelin restaurants. Ca Vittoria is an exceptional one run in the 1990s by Italy’s first female Michelin-starred chef. Her grandson Massimiliano Musso cooks his nonna’s recipe for the regional dish agnolotti del plin (pasta parcels filled with beef and cabbage). The three Michelin-starred Villa Crespi is a Moorish pleasure palace an hour north on Lake Orta that’s super glamorous.
Entry into design
My original dream was to be a commercial pilot, which kept me on a science/maths track, until the fateful day in Year 10 when I had an argument with my teacher and walked out of class. I passed an art class that was being held under the trees and joined in. After discovering how much I loved this whole new world, I took it as an extra subject. At one point I won a regional Ministerial Art Award. After a year of studying to be a pilot, my artistic side won out and I moved from the engineering faculty to architecture. My first obsession with built environments was creating worlds out of Lego as a child; little did I know it would become my life.
A tropic playground
I recommend exploring the Palm Island Group in Queensland. You can snorkel, hike, fish and shuck oysters straight off the rock on Orpheus Island, where there is a beautiful resort.
I spent a magical week there on a floating barge for my 12th birthday.
The heart of home
I took my first step into kitchens a decade ago when I created a “fourth wall” concept for German design studio Poggenphol, with the kitchen as a stage. Now Kimm and I have a custom kitchen company, Cabbonet. Instead of fitting a series of boxes into a space with a sink somewhere, we create zones that reference an earlier Victorian era, which had a bread-baking area, wet area, larder etc. Cabbonet is a British brand with showrooms in London, Milan, and around the US.
Landing in LA
We just opened our new Cabbonet showroom in West Hollywood. I love the buzz; Ferraris and Lamborghinis are lining up on Melrose Avenue all day.
Comfort zone
I’m quite tall so I love the beautiful new A350 Virgin Atlantic Business Class seat, along with the airline’s exceptional service. Delta Business Class is my other favourite. If I’m not rushing, such as a red-eye flight from the west to east coast after a launch, I enjoy a relaxing lounge experience.
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