Hosting With Heart

Based in South Australia, sisters Emma Read and Sarah Hall are both stylists who have established their own creative business, Read & Hall, with the core aim of creating beautiful interiors, with an emphasis on accommodation spaces, for themselves and others.

In 2019, they opened their first holiday property, My Sister & The Sea, to great acclaim and a whirlwind of praiseworthy press, and more recently have launched their second property, a visually striking, completely enchanting pink beach house on the Yorke Peninsula which they appropriately named Love & Mutiny.

Despite originally forging careers as a social worker and a lawyer, these industrious, happy-go-lucky sisters are now thriving in their own business, meshing their love for history, family and design to craft a range of beautiful products and experiences for a diverse client base.

Jessica Bellef is a Sydney-based writer and stylist. After a long stint as the founding Head of Styling for Australia's largest online retailer of furniture and homewares, Temple & Webster, Jess has gone on to forge a successful career as a writer, most notably releasing her first stunning coffee-table book, 'Individual', published by Murdoch Books, in 2019.

In the last few years, she has also written for a number of leading design and lifestyle magazines including Home Beautiful, Inside Out, WellBeing and Country Style.

She now spends her time working on a mix of writing and styling projects from the 1970's-inspired home she shares with husband Beau.

In 2011, in part in an attempt to escape the stifling Sydney house prices, Georgie Stuart and her partner Matt purchased Bimlow Cottage, a historic 1890's rural property in a small town called Edith, on the doorstep of the Blue Mountains. Five years later, Georgie and Matt purchased another historic property for a mere $10K, relocated it to the same block of land as Bimlow, and started a 3-year renovation and nurturing process, gently converting the relocated property into their family home and Bimlow into a unique regional retreat for guests.

Since opening the doors of Bimlow to the public in late 2019, the modest improvements Georgie and Matt have made to the cottage have rendered it a 'must-visit' destination for those looking for an authentic country escape with character in abundance and without any unnecessary gloss.

With her signature industriousness, Georgie has also recently converted one of the lockable rooms of the cottage into a small shop for her to sell many of her vintage finds and other favourite locally produced products to guests.

Born and bred Tasmanian Mary Jackson, along with her partner Dave, opened the doors to their breathtaking Dodge's Ferry holiday shack, aptly named Clifftop on Park, back in 2016 and since doing so, haven't looked back. In the five or so years they've been operating, they've managed to amass 510 Airbnb reviews, only 4 of which have been less than 5 stars. No mean feat as I am sure even the most seasoned of accommodation hosts will agree.

Mary puts this largely down to her ethos of creating a unique space that really reflects the history and passions of the owners, as well as the fine art of under-promising and over-delivering; a simple motto that in today's fast-paced world, seems to have been somewhat forgotten.

Jen has now closed down her last property, The Fox House, Kyneton, due in most to the financial pressure of Melbourne's recent fourth Covid-19 related lockdown.

In this short episode, she shares some of her plans for the Hosting With Heart community forward, including the creation of a new directory website for members. She's also looking forward to hosting the first in-person Hosting With Heart catch up in Melbourne in July.

Lucy Scott is nothing short of a modern dynamo. Despite a background in remedial massage therapy, she wanted to try her hand at renovating - potentially even as a full time career - and after buying her first family home about 6 years ago, dipped her toe in the water.

What followed was a period of years gradually renovating the house, including the establishment of a self-contained studio, which Lucy would ultimately list on the short-term rental market. This helped Lucy and her husband Daz pay off their mortgage way more efficiently, while at the same time exposing their three young daughters to a diverse range of people from different cultural backgrounds.

Having pushed through the challenges of Covid, Lucy and Daz sold that same family home only a few days ago and Lucy is now at the beginning of an incredibly exciting new career chapter - one that will see her take on renovating homes professionally.

Beth Cooper, along with her partner Rod, owns Silvermere Coastal Retreat in Culburra Beach, New South Wales.

Following a number of years successfully buying, renovating and selling properties in New South Wales and Victoria, as well as going through a divorce, Beth, with her Dad in tow, finally came across the property that would soon be known as Silvermere in the midst of a search for a suitable fixer-upper in early 2020.

Despite Rod's initial reservations, the couple have turned the house into an impeccably styled, warm and welcoming coastal escape, one that's been booked out solidly almost since the word go. And Beth has managed this all while holding down a demanding full-time job in Sydney.

Jade Just is a highly experienced travel communications and marketing specialist, having spent over 12 years working for an impressive array of employers including Western Australia's Scoop Magazine and as a travel writer for Melbourne model, influencer and brand ambassador Bec Judd.

Since 2019, she's performed the role of Communications Officer for St John of God Health Care, a role that, given the advent of Covid-19 in Australia in particular, has proven in equal parts enormously satisfying and challenging.

To counter this, Jade is currently in the throes of renovating a beautiful, heritage-listed cottage in the southern Western Australian town of Quininup, known as Millars by the Lake. Millars is set to open in Spring, 2021, an event that Jade and her young family are hotly anticipating.

Tara Larnach is the owner and manager of Simpson Cottage in Bundeena, a stunning coastal village approx 1 hour south of Sydney.

Having stayed in the cottage with her family as guests in the late 2000's, a year or so later Tara became aware that the property they had all fallen in love with was for sale, and was fortunate enough to be able to purchase it, completely furnished, cleaner on board and ready to go.

The rest, they say is history and in this value-packed episode, Tara shares a wealth of generous and honest insights into her journey as the host of one of the most unique historical holiday properties in Australia.

Since Melbourne's hard lockdown ended in November, 2020, host Jen Clark's short-term accommodation management business Ranges Escapes has gone on a journey from being insanely busy and growing at a rate of knots, to in recent weeks winding down after she made the very tough - but necessary - decision to scale-back to managing only one property ongoing, The Fox House, Kyneton.

In this episode, Jen candidly shares how the death of her beloved 8-year-old rescue greyhound George, combined with total mental and physical burnout, led her to make the decision to simplify her life and focus on being more present for her young son Max in his last year before primary school.