The Sydney-based architect and designer Daniel Boddam stands in front of his Mosman project, Methuen, and the Rolls-Royce Spectre. Photograph by Gene Alberts. For most people, the sandstone cliffs that jut into Sydney Harbour at Middle Head in Mosman inspire thoughts of fresh air and little else. But to the renowned Australian architect and designer Daniel Boddam, their organic forms, shaped by erosion and time, could inform the crook of a sofa or the ceiling of a house.
“It’s a very natural setting,” he says. “Some of the windblown sandstone shapes inspire me. The sedimentary colour tones, the sandstone rock and some of the angophora trees as well. We try to look at utilising the colour palette of nature and weaving that into our interiors.”
For years, this inner-city Sydney sanctuary has helped guide the thinking of the designer, who is known for designing luxury homes and custom furniture, working out of a studio in Sydney and with showrooms in Sydney and Melbourne. Boddam’s parents were also architects, and he has 25 years’ experience in design.
Today, Boddam is giving something of an architectural tour of this Sydney peninsula, revealing the coastal landscapes that shape his designs. To get around, we’ve skipped the hire car place and secured something more in line with Boddam’s philosophies of design and craftsmanship, luxury and sustainability — the new Rolls-Royce Spectre. Understated in its dark Midnight Sapphire hue yet with plenty of presence, the Spectre is a landmark vehicle for the British marque. This is its first electric car since the Honourable Charles Rolls and Sir Henry Royce had their fortuitous first meeting at a hotel in Manchester, England, in 1904, leading to the creation of one of the world’s best-known luxury motoring brands.
“Spectre” means apparition, which follows the brand’s supernatural naming convention that has spawned the model names Phantom and Ghost. Rolls-Royce calls the Spectre “the world’s first ultra-luxury electric super coupe”. Priced from $770,000 in Australia, the Spectre was imagined as a blank canvas — owners are expected to tailor their car to their unique personalities and needs.
Cars and architecture have long intersected. Le Corbusier once tried designing a car, the curious Voiture Minimum, in 1936. Frank Lloyd Wright, the designer of Fallingwater in Pennsylvania, was a noted petrolhead. “A car is not a horse, and it doesn’t need a barn,” he is quoted as saying. In many of his designs, Wright made a point of adding a special place for a car. He wasn’t the first to do so, and certainly not the last.
Around Mosman in Sydney, where street parking can be difficult, many an architect has incorporated a garage. And no matter where you go in the neighbourhood, you get at least a glimpse of water. Boddam takes us to Villa Carlo, one of his previous projects, which he calls “a holistic, contemporary interpretation of the California bungalow”.
“The architectural language flows through to the smallest of details,” Boddam says. “The macro is in the micro.” There’s a clear connection between the luxury of Boddam’s work and that of the Rolls-Royce, trimmed in the finest materials and bristling with thoughtful details. “I’d say both exhibit a quiet sense of luxury, which is what I’m trying to portray,” Boddam says. “Both consider simplicity, I guess, which underpins the design ethos of close attention to detail, celebrating the materials in which it’s made, not seeking to shout but able to stand out, being obviously finely made and a beautiful design.”
At Mosman’s Balmoral Beach, the Rolls-Royce doesn’t seem so understated, as it becomes the focal point for several smartphone cameras. Yet when it wants to, it’s seemingly able to blend back in. Motoring in near silence using nothing but electrons, Boddam sees similarities between the sustainability of his practice — think increased green-plot ratio, rainwater reuse, solar, passive heating and cooling, recycled materials, biodiverse landscaping — and the zero-emissions future conjured by the Spectre.
“Sustainability is central to my work,” he says. “Driving the fully electric Spectre reinforces this commitment to the future. Its CO2-free architecture aligns with my vision of responsible design.”
At Middle Head, visitors can wander among historical military buildings nestled into bushland. “Middle Head’s barracks blend heritage with raw landscapes,” says Boddam. “It’s a constant reminder of how design connects history with the environment around it.” With many clients electing to renovate heritage properties while incorporating the latest in home technology and architectural thinking, the interplay between history and modernity in the Spectre is not lost on Boddam.
The entire trip today is completed on a single charge. The Spectre’s large 102kWh lithium-ion battery pack can support up to 530 kilometres of range. Charging from 10 to 80 per cent — enough for an additional 370 kilometres — takes just 34 minutes using a 195kW DC fast charger. With a home 22kW AC charger, a zero to 100 per cent charge takes five and a half hours — keeping in mind that you’ll rarely pull into your driveway in a Rolls-Royce with a fully depleted battery.
After a day behind the wheel of the effortlessly powerful, whisper-quiet electric Spectre, Boddam reflects on the impression it has left. “The classicism of the car and the functionality of the car [inspired me],” he says. “That each touchpoint was really very well executed made me think of architecture down to the drawing — how important the smallest of details are to function.”
