What makes an entertainer’s home in Canberra?

Home entertaining largely moves indoors during the cooler months, but the chosen location comes down to comfort and ambience.

Nick Southwell of Ray White Queanbeyan/Jerrabomberra says a range of indoor and outdoor options is key to entertaining at any time of the year.

“The cover property, for example, offers multiple living areas and outdoor spaces – all of which offer different options depending on the time of the year,” he says.

“Typically, guests want to feel comfortable wherever they are, and that often dictates the best place to hold a dinner or other event.”

Indoor spaces centred on a fireplace deliver a special ambience as does a bigger space where guests can gather.

“It’s no surprise the community hub of the modern home is the open-plan kitchen, living, dining space,” Southwell says.

“It allows hosts to still be part of the socialising while co-ordinating meals and refreshments.”

David Stokes of Blackshaw Manuka says old-style formal dining spaces still have an audience with buyers who grew up with those rooms in their parent’s homes.

“They engender a feeling of nostalgia and enable a reinvention of those family dinners around a big table,” he says.

Stokes says entertaining has also embraced the digital age with apps now able to control many aspects of the experience.

“For example, homes can be warmed up on the way home, lighting can be controlled, blinds set and audio playlists prepped and played through integrated room speakers,” he says.

• Plan: Start with your audience in mind and to what level you want to entertain them. Is it just food and drink or is it fun and games as well? 
• Design: Zones can be a way to maximise space while meeting a variety of needs: meal preparation, dining, lounging, perhaps a pool space, playground or – if you have the space – tennis or basketball.
• Choice: There is a mind-boggling choice of indoor and outdoor entertaining trends with covered spaces, fire pits and big-ticket al fresco kitchens popular favourites. Watchlist: outdoor workstations in the warmer months.

Check out our top pick of homes for the entertainer:

Greenleigh

“Home” as a concept has undergone some redefinition over the COVID years. It’s now a place where we routinely work, it has also become our refuge and has taken on new roles in recreation and entertaining.

This five-bedroom renovated home offers all that. It sits on 4800 square metres in the sought-after Greenleigh Estate, just under 15 minutes from Canberra Airport. 

Apart from size and plenty of space, it presents a compelling entertaining package with an inground pool and tennis court.

The at-a-glance floor plan comprises four bedrooms, a formal dining and living room, a large study (or further bedroom), a sunken sitting room and three generous patios.

Inside, it’s light and bright with high raked ceilings and timber panelled ceiling features. There’s an enclosed front patio and a sun-filled family room with pitched roof windows.

The sunken sitting room with double-glazed stacker doors will appeal as well a formal living room with a fireplace. Energy-saving highlights include the double-glazed windows in the family, kitchen and the sunken sitting room, as well as Velux skylights.

There’s a large entertainer’s kitchen that oozes sophistication through a monochromatic colour palette, punctuated by timber benchtops and a bright red Scandium gas oven.

Three generous-sized bedrooms on this level share the main bathroom. The upstairs main suite features a dressing room (or nursery) and hosts a generous en suite with a spa bath. The study or fifth bedroom is also on this level. 

Price guide: $1.6 million-$1.76 million

Auction: 5.30pm, July 13

Agent: Ray White Queanbeyan/Jerrabomberra, Nick Southwell 0432 543 640

Or try these:

Mawson

Price guide: $1.3 million +

Auction: 12:30pm, July 16

Agent: The Property Collective, Obi Shadmaan 0423 980 763

Calwell

Price guide: $875,000

Private sale

Agent: One Agency Sandy Morris, Zac Morris 0432 141 648

Monash

Agent: $880,000 +

Auction: 11:30am, July 16

Agent: The Property Collective, Jacob Stanton 0499 999 734