Skip to playerSkip to main content
Never Too Small
After years of dreaming about renovating their 55sqm/592sqft apartment in Sydney's inner west, creative maximalists—artist Kirthana Selvaraj and community worker Vicki Papa—teamed up with designer Nicholas Gurney to create a calm, creative home that that still delivers "big house energy". Gurney reimagined the layout by removing internal walls and introducing clever custom joinery to streamline storage and define flexible zones for working, resting, and entertaining. A multi-functional dining and work table slides neatly beneath the kitchen benchtop, preserving a clean, open look when not in use. Clever details like circular cut-out handles and mirror panels enhance flow and function, while the couple's personalities shine through curated art, colourful accents, and "The Everything Room"—a vibrant guest and creative space filled with books, hobbies, and personal treasures.

00:00-01:15 Introduction
01:15-01:39 Location
01:39-02:10 Entrance
02:10-04:17 Living Room
04:17-05:45 Balcony
05:45-08:18 Dining Room
08:18-09:54 Kitchen
09:54-12:17 Bedroom
12:17-15:37 Bathroom
15:37-17:06 Creative Studio
17:06-18:52 Conclusion

Artworks mentioned in episode:
2:36 Artwork in living room - Vanetta Nampijinpa Hudson
https://yaamaganu.com.au/?s=vanetta

2:49 Artwork in the living room - Moss Hopkins

3:38 Artwork in the living room - Douglas Schofield
https://www.instagram.com/dougie_schofield/

8:55- Artwork in the kitchen - Vicki Papa
https://www.instagram.com/topjobjob/

11:59 Artwork in bedroom - Karen Black
https://www.karenblack.com.au/
https://www.instagram.com/karenblackstudio/?hl=en

12:06 Artwork in bedroom - Paul Donald
https://www.paulcdonald.com/

#smallapartment #architecture #interiordesign

How I Live Small Ep.7
Owners: Kirthana Selvaraj and Vicki Papa
https://www.kirthanaselvaraj.com/
Designer: https://www.nicholasgurney.com.au/

Produced by New Mac Video Agency
Creator: Colin Chee
Director & Cinematographer: Nam Tran
Producer: Lindsay Barnard
Editor: Jessica Ruasol
Music: Artlist.io
Capao da Canoa by Amos Ever Hadani
Flat White feat. Mantrick by Yestalgia
Matcha Latte by Aves
Cruise Control by LOLEK
Crème by Barrell
Driving Slow by intomuffins
Weekdays in Blue by Simon Berggren Ballads
Vanille by Notize
Smooth Lab by Simon Berggren Ballads

Share your projects with us- https://www.nevertoosmall.com/submissions
Subscribe to our newsletter- https://www.nevertoosmall.com/subscribe
Check out our store- https://www.nts-store.com
Website- https://www.nevertoosmall.com
Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/nvtsmall
Facebook- https://www.facebook.com/nvtsmall
Transcript
00:04I've always wanted to renovate. It was like a longer-term plan to actually try
00:10and save some money and just not have to borrow massive copious amounts which
00:14happened anyway. Then I just got sick of waiting. My friend got his
00:23apartment renovated by Nick Gurney. My friend was so much happier kind of
00:29living in it afterwards. So that kind of motivated me to be like well maybe now's
00:33the time. The best thing we ever did was engage someone like Nick who specializes
00:39in smaller spaces to be able to give us that big house energy.
00:45I'm Kathana Salvaraj. I am an artist and academic. I'm Vicki Papa. I'm a community
00:51development worker and sometimes creative and this is Bernie. She's a year and three
00:57months and doesn't have a job. We all live together in this two-bedroom flat and
01:03it's approximately 55 square meters. The apartment's small, Bernie's small.
01:08You've got small hands. I've got small hands.
01:15We live in Larrickville in the inner west of Sydney. We're about 10 minutes out of
01:20the city. I actually grew up about 40 minutes from here and I remember the
01:25thinking when I grow up I want to live in Marrickville. It's a beautiful blend of
01:30old and new. A lot of families have lived here for multiple generations. A really
01:35diverse and a really safe welcoming area. So this is the entry of the apartment.
01:42As you can see here we've got a mirror which is nice. It reflects the outside in
01:47because it can get quite dark in here and then we've got this little pop of
01:51Matisse on the way in. We don't know how long this artwork will be here but it's
01:54here for now. We had a really lovely neighbour who took such care with all the
02:00plants making them come all the way down the stairwell and then when she left kind
02:05of to like honour her vision I've continued.
02:10As soon as you walk in you're in the living room immediately. This unit here was
02:17designed by Nick Gurney. It holds our records and our record player. Our favourite
02:23part is there's a little baby table here which is our coffee table. It's on the
02:28on the wheel so we can lock it into place if we need to and then when we don't
02:32need it anymore we just wheel it back in.
02:36This is the heart of the lounge room and it's Veneta Hudson. A lot of the colours we
02:42even have in this home sort of are already in this colour palette and so it just
02:46dis-informed a lot of the colour palette with the other paintings we have.
02:50The autumn in here we can like sort of stretch our legs. Bernie you know she knows
02:54this is this is what it is.
02:57When people come over we split yeah we move that over.
03:00But then they can sit here and we can sit here and it becomes
03:03a little bit more of a supported seating arrangement.
03:08When I grew up my dad would grow a lot of veggies and so I'm used to like having a
03:12lot of greenery around
03:13and it's something that I actually miss being in an apartment so that's why I've made the effort of
03:18having a lot of greenery in in our space.
03:22Here we have Bernie's little throne. She's starting to get a bit too tall like her legs seem to be
03:27growing longer but the rest of her body seems to be staying the same so we might need to move
03:32the
03:32bed from here eventually but that's where she kind of sits and looks at us awkwardly.
03:37That's where she judges us.
03:40I was living here first so Key and I have lived here for maybe five years together.
03:47We've been living in it for two years since the renovations.
03:51We spend the most time in the living room so we wanted that to feel the biggest in the space.
03:58That's why getting two walls but one load-bearing wall removed completely transformed this space.
04:05If you are finding a small space at least have one part of that that feels a little bit bigger
04:11or a
04:11little bit more light a little bit more room to move in because then it won't really feel small.
04:17We don't have a backyard but we have a little balcony.
04:20Vicky's beautifully arranged this small sliver of a balcony to incorporate all the plants that we
04:26really love.
04:27I try and select pretty hardy plants like ones that are kind of like succulents.
04:33Any bird in the ibis family doesn't land on here because of these plants so they act as a protection.
04:40Because there isn't that much space we've tried to hang the plants over the other side
04:45which gives us more space here for this quite wide bench.
04:53This is where I think I feel the biggest impact of the renovations particularly the storage and the
05:00open space.
05:01Nick was really clever he was like how can we utilize whatever's left of the storage into
05:06something that will work for you know you working from home or studying from home.
05:10He created this sort of sleeve where I can put my laptop and my charger and my headphones
05:16and plug in you know my charger when I need to.
05:21And then wheel out this table which perfectly fits in width here and then you just lock it down when
05:29you need to study.
05:30You can feed the wiring through the hole that's in here.
05:34You can sit down you can you can type on your laptop or have dinner or terrify Bernie.
05:39Sorry Bernie.
05:40We'll just wheel it back.
05:41There we go.
05:43Another really important thing with this storage is pantry essentials.
05:48And I wanted to make sure I could reach everything at the back.
05:51Sometimes you have those spices that get really crusty and gross because you just can never reach them.
05:56And I just never wanted to have that problem again.
05:59In the brief we speak about things that are important to us and how we live and what we enjoy
06:05doing.
06:07Having Nick really work with us and he asked us a lot of questions about you know where do you
06:12think you're going to need the most storage.
06:13With the kitchen I love to cook you know I can't just use one pot.
06:18And so Nick really understood the assignment basically and was really aware okay the storage
06:23needs to be centralized in this area and then we don't need to worry too much about storage
06:28and other areas instead of just putting like what would be typically a massive block of storage
06:33somewhere else out of sight.
06:36Another great element are these circles cut out so you can actually see what's inside.
06:41It was just more useful to have something neat and compact but also it was like a little window
06:46into like a portal that was behind.
06:49If I want to make toast in the morning I don't want to look at the toaster all day long
06:53you know
06:54what I mean. With regards to tucking things away when it's the dining tables out in an open space it
07:01just becomes a pylon for like crap. For a small space if I'm not immediately kind of using it I
07:10don't
07:10really want it to be taking space away from other things. This as well has more storage.
07:16All our internet stuff lives in here like all the internet wiring.
07:23We don't have any ceiling lights in this particular area so these are quite lovely at night.
07:30We don't have an extractor fan above the burner which I'm really happy about because they can be
07:36quite cumbersome because there's a lot of flow through the window it doesn't really impact us
07:41it goes like straight out. The fumes go straight out. This is where our cutlery lives and this is
07:48where our plates are. It just looks like it's actually just like a bench. The mirror cabinet holds
07:54our electricals because that was like a hideous thing just there on the wall. The mirror it's almost
08:01like creating another little window so then you see the outside reflected in which then also complements
08:07this window here. The mirrors are helping as well with kind of making the space look bigger.
08:13I really like the lighting feature here and it's given us an opportunity to put some of the trinkets
08:20that we've gotten and because we don't have much space I think we gravitate towards some smaller items.
08:26There was a wall here before which got removed. Now all our laundry stuff kind of lives here.
08:32Washing machine in there. Dishwasher here. This second sink's been really useful. If there's like
08:38a lot of kitchen mess you can kind of contain it to one side. We have to have it here
08:43because in
08:44Sydney there's a regulation where in your laundry area you have to have a sink. I tend to always
08:50gravitate towards this sink but I notice key goes towards this sink. It's worked out for both of us
08:56because there's one sink that each of us prefer. So this tiny space is our hallway and so down here
09:04we come into it was an old linen cabinet but now we've turned it into a shoe cabinet. There's like
09:11a water main hidden under there. If we need to access it the cutout just allows us to to open
09:17it up.
09:17We've also managed to hide our apartment intercom in here. We're always arguing for shoe space but it's
09:26a bit better in there now. This is our bedroom. The bed takes up most of the room because we
09:35went on
09:36a holiday once and we we slept in a king bed and we were like why can't we bring this
09:40kind of luxury
09:41into our everyday space. We forgot though that we live in a very small apartment. Anyway we've made it work.
09:48We've usually got things in boxes. We've got like these zip bags and they're good for blankets that
09:55we're not using during the warmer months. Throw rugs like those kinds of things we'll just put under
10:00the bed and then when we need them we'll pull them back out. We've actually had to cut a lot
10:05of things
10:05because this simply did not fit under the bed which is probably a good thing in long term. This wardrobe
10:11was already there so we just kept it. I think we'd love if it was a bit bigger so we
10:18just kind of
10:18put extra bedding there. Our clothes. I wish we had more storage, more bedroom storage actually.
10:27But clothes, that's a weak point. Like even on the way up here I noticed there was a package outside
10:32that Kei has purchased recently and I was like where are we going to fit that? Where are we going
10:37to fit
10:37this? That wardrobe that is bursting at the seams. I think if I open that door it might just jump
10:43out.
10:43This is a bigger kind of step ladder for getting up to the higher parts because again short and this
10:51is our ironing board. Because of the angle of where the bed is we can't really put it under
10:55under the bed so we just utilize this space here. It's also got some art in here that we really
11:02really
11:02love. So this work is from an artist that I've loved for a long time Karen Black and this artist
11:09Vicki we can introduce this artist. So it's Paul Donald. I knew Paul like 15 years ago so depending
11:15on how you're feeling you could flip it around and then it looks like a completely different kind of artwork.
11:22This door here with the glass, the rippled glass inside is leading us to the best room of the
11:29apartment which is the bathroom. What we really like about this new door is that it's letting so much
11:34more light in. The only thing about it is that if you are in there your privacy is a bit
11:39thwarted.
11:40Only if someone puts their face right up to there. Let's hope no one does that Vicki. I'm naming you.
11:45What I really love about this bathroom is that even though it's quite a tiny space
11:50the way Nick has designed it is allowing a lot more light and air into this space so it doesn't
11:56actually feel very small when you're in it. And that's also to do with the dual mirrors on either side
12:03of this glass partition. Because we're quite short it's really good that we have a sink that's a
12:08little bit lower. There's some beautiful brushed brass finishings here that we have. It's copper.
12:15Brushed copper. Thanks wifey. We have a small hand towel feature that Nick designed to actually just
12:21fit inside the joinery and also we've got storage here underneath. So we've got a little bin inside there
12:29and we've also got supplies like cleaning supplies for the bathroom. There used to be a bathtub where
12:36this walk-in shower is. You had to like grab the sink and like lift your leg up and then
12:41climb into the
12:41bathtub. So it's really nice to be able to just walk in and have the standing showers.
12:48So what you can see with the bench top of the sink it continues onto the bench here. We really
12:54liked this
12:55sense of elongation that it gives. So even though this glass interrupts it you really don't feel that.
13:01The light at the top also continues on to this part of the shower as well as the mirrors. There's
13:09no real interruption between the sink and the shower space so it does feel a lot bigger than what it
13:15was
13:15before. All of the things mechanics I guess that help the toilet function is sort of hidden behind these
13:22tiles. We decided to extend this sort of like framing up into storage up here and then we have our
13:29stuff
13:29lined up inside. You can see that we've really crammed things in there again. It's a learning
13:35opportunity for us. The toilet is also specifically a very small toilet. It's not like a regular size
13:42toilet just because if we had that it would take up too much space. So we had to get used
13:47to this little
13:47toilet but I think it's now something that I'm like I can't even tell the difference anymore.
13:54If we were to reposition say like a shaving cabinet or a mirrored cabinet to where the mirror is
13:59it again would extend and protrude out here and then it would take up a lot of space and so
14:05part of the
14:06design also was to be able to plug things in. It's kind of covered at the moment but there's a
14:11power
14:11source there an outlet sorry so if you want to I don't know like blow dry your hair shave your
14:17eyebrows
14:18I mean what do people do with a shaver you want to blow dry your hair you can plug things
14:23in there
14:24and they can thread it through there and it doesn't go flying everywhere. Bringing plants in has been
14:29really nice so because the steam from the shower it almost operates like this mini terrarium so there
14:35was a lot of trial and error a lot of dead plants. The peace lily is loving life so I
14:39think that might be a
14:40good one to keep. So now we're going to go into the second room this room is where we have
14:47all most
14:48of our belongings but it's also acts as a spare room as well so if people want to come and
14:53stay
14:53we just kind of you know roll a mat out on the floor and they can stay with us. I've
14:59got a combination
14:59of a lot of little bits and bobs we've collected over the years, quite a lot of books, a lot
15:06of records
15:07that don't fit in the lounge room. Nick designed the joinery the book shelving around the window and
15:15also this desk here and then we just added this this was the table that was in here before which
15:20is just like a basic IKEA table and so then it turns into an L so Key and I can
15:25actually use the room at
15:26the same time one of us can sit on that side and one of us can sit on this side
15:30and underneath it acts
15:32as another storage solution. So we've got some of our butane gas things from camping, I've got a whole
15:41bunch of like blues CDs. This kind of also operates as a bit of like a creative studio space as
15:49well,
15:49it's an everything room that's kind of like us. I mean our personalities I feel are really infused
15:55specifically in this room. While the rest of the house is teaching us things this room is containing
16:01a lot of who we actually are. I think we need something like that in small spaces that are unique
16:08to the personality of the people inhabiting it. This is one of the smallest places I've lived in
16:14but it feels the most expansive internally for me. We're not sort of confined within these walls,
16:20we consider that when we go to the dog park that's our shared backyard. We've become like a lovely
16:27little community and it's been a nice way to kind of get to know our neighbours and also see some
16:34of
16:34their kids grow up too. We have you know our work spaces like our job work spaces. Key has a
16:41studio where
16:42she paints and like where it gets a lot more messier. We're kind of sharing ourselves amongst all these
16:48different spaces but I think this one's where we really wanted it to be a place that was restoring.
16:54Yeah. Restoring or restorative? Both. Both. Okay. A tip for living in a small space would be like
17:02invest in the design and the advice. That's made all the difference. In the discussions with Nick
17:09I spoke a lot about how work is really busy. When I come home I just want to be able
17:15to walk into a space
17:16that feels organised. If I need to get something I know where it is and I just wanted it to
17:22feel
17:22peaceful and I think that's what we've ended up with. Even before the renovations Vicky's so good
17:30with design and where she places art and so there was still this like a similar feeling of you know
17:37this is a this is a home. Yeah and it had a the potentiality and then now with the renovation
17:42we've
17:42been able to take it align better to the next level really. That's what it's like. Oh you want to
17:47take me out to run. That's what it's like. That's what it's like.
17:49That sounds great. Yeah that's what it's like. Okay I'm just going to write this very important email and then
17:54let's go out.
17:56That's pretty much what it is.

Recommended