Leaving the bach after summer holidays is always hard and sad and a little depressing. The pack up is horrible. Aside from the actual packing and cleaning, there is also the mental packup. The realisation that your charmed parallel life in the sun is once again on hold, and the reality of back to school, back to work and just back to plain old reality can hit hard.

And as the car leaves the beach, and winds up and out of the valley that is our little piece of paradise, there are always a few tears. It has never been any different for as long as I can remember. And as I’ve been holidaying at the same beach, since I was six or seven, that is a long, long time.

However, aside from the realisation that coming home means the end of a lovely, unstructured, relaxing, sun-filled holiday, I do love returning home. After the long drive, as soon as you round the Petone foreshore and can suddenly see the city in the distance, things start to feel optimistic and better. And setting foot inside the door always feels like a wonderful surprise, almost as if I’d forgotten how lovely it feels. Feels being the operative word here.

Philosopher Alain de Botton (The School of Life) writes “Belief in the significance of architecture is premised on the notion that we are, for better and for worse, different people in different places – and on the conviction that it is architecture’s task to render vivid to us who we might ideally be.”

Visually, city home and beach home are poles apart. City is much more contemporary, ‘modern world’ and feels huge in comparison to the beach, where, if I stand in the bach kitchen, I can pretty much see into every room. Beach is more rustic and simple and needs-must, and a nod to slow living. Both are an eclectic mix of chippy old and shiny new furniture and collections, lovingly curated over time, and appropriate to each space, although the proportions of old and new obviously differ. Chippy old and upcycled with a touch of new comfort suits the simplicity of our little beach house so well. Contemporary peppered with vintage suits the space and feel of the city.

Both are perfectly imperfect. Both reflect the way we live when we live in each. Each space brings out my perfectly imperfect best (and worst, but I’m working on that!)

How lucky I am then, that both feel like home.

Amanda xx

PS In case you think I am misspelling the word ‘beach’ each time you read ‘bach’, a bach is what we call a holiday cottage here in New Zealand.

(photography and styling by Amanda Holland for perfectly imperfect living)