A Mediterranean-Inspired Getaway in an Australian Surf Town

23.05.2024 - 13:27 / nytimes.com

The origins of Il Delfino, a new oceanside inn in the surf town of Yamba on Australia’s east coast, go back to its founder’s childhood. “I grew up in this area, fascinated by this ramshackle surf cottage,” says the Australian fashion stylist Sheree Commerford. “Having it was a secret dream for as long as I can remember.” At the end of 2021, Commerford bought the building, which had previously been a rustic family lodge, and spent the last two years transforming it into a four-room inn and bungalow that she opened last month. “We wanted to keep all its original midcentury features but add inspiration from some of my favorite travels in the Mediterranean,” she says. That means whitewashed walls, citrus trees in terra-cotta pots and a terrace with Italian-made sun beds and uninterrupted ocean views. The guest rooms, which are named for Italian destinations like Ravello and Ischia, are all equipped with kitchens and each feature a colorful mural by the Australian artist Heidi Middleton. There’s no restaurant at the hotel, but staff will organize breakfast boxes upon request and recommend places to eat in Yamba. They can also help arrange whale-watching excursions, in-house massages and surf lessons.

A veteran of the media and design world, William Li founded his art consultancy, Armature Projects, last year as a way of bridging art and interiors. This month, Li and the interior designer Aamir Khandwala, in collaboration with the rug company Fort Street Studio and the Asian American Pacific Islanders Design Alliance (AAPIDA), present “Eastern Standard,” an exhibition of works by emerging and midcareer artists and designers of Asian descent. Li’s selections, which are displayed in vignettes arranged by Khandwala at Fort Street Studio’s Manhattan showroom, include blocky seating and shelves made from dripping black and brightly colored foam by the South Korean designer Sang Hoon Kim and embroidered scrim works by the Cambodian-born artist Hon Chen-Gaudet. There are also stoneware pieces by the Japanese artist Niho Kozuru, who comes from a lineage of ceramists who’ve been making the pottery known as Agano ware on the island of Kyushu for hundreds of years, as well as a large acrylic-and-oil painting by the actress Lucy Liu. Khandwala, who was born in Pakistan, shows one of his own calligraphy pieces, a collaboration with the artist Rachel Jensen that features seven of the approximately 18 different words for love in his native Urdu.

When Marie-Louise Sciò’s signature gold evening clutch fell into a state of irremediable disrepair, the Rome-based chief executive and creative director of the Pellicano Group’s hotels, and Issimo, an online shop that sells Italian goods, began to search for an alternative, only