The Salim Mehajer House is in the news: https://www.smh.com.au/property/news/salim-mehajer-s-lidcombe-home-listed-for-mortgagee-in-possession-sale-20240822-p5k4cg.html

Liam :fnord:

Now many would rush to condemn Mehajer as just another petty con artist, an electoral scam merchant. Which obviously he is. But he’s also a unique thing in this society’s aesthetic culture, someone who dreamed of pushing a house design way, way past the point anyone had gone to. There’s something aristocratic about the level of gauche he achieved (in a boring suburban street! In Granville!) that you have to admire a bit

Liam :fnord:

There’s nothing more quintessentially Australian than ‘borrowing way more money than is wise, to spend on ugly-arse housing’. What offends the SMH of course is that he did it while being conspicuously ethnic. If he’d gone all in on a Haberfield tuck pointed bungalow with plantation shutters and everything painted cream inside, this would not be news.

Salim Mehajer led the way in a specific kind of aesthetics and he deserves some credit for this art

Liam :fnord:

Reader, be honest, and in that article compare Mehajer’s house with all the others (owned and sold by more banal rich people) and ask yourself which is the most expressive of the identity and values of the resident. All the others are basic and interchangeable boxes of generic consumable goods. Oh, a patio with iron outdoor furniture. Oh, a mock Tudor villa on a colonial-squatted property. Yawn.

Only a truly creative person would go full on onyx staircases. We must condemn him for using bad cheques to pay for it, true, but never for his taste.

Stephen Collins

@liamvhogan while you're talking Mehajer, are you aware of The Candy Shop Mansion and the tasteless gronk that owns (and is selling) it?

https://candyshopmansion.com/csmwp/

https://www.realestate.com.au/property-house-qld-helensvale-143823528

Liam :fnord:

@trib I was not, but I approve of this

Stephen Collins

@liamvhogan diving into the website is an entire experience I still feel tainted by.

nick

@liamvhogan also, the sheer commitment required to not just build that staircase, but actually have to walk on it. Every morning you're just one misstep away from bone-crushing impact with polished stone and/or the chromed bling of a custom chopper.