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Guest room with sandstone walls facing the ocean

Guest room with sandstone walls facing the ocean




Calloway Thorne





Creative response · Calloway Thorne



Saltbush Bronte: a hotel cut from the cliff.





Our concept response for 24 keys, a restaurant and a rooftop pool, ready for guests in March 2028.



Prepared for

Saltbush Hotels

Date

Tuesday 7 September 2027



Opening

Wednesday 8 March 2028

Stop dressing rooms to look at the cliff. Build them out of it.
The brief, as we heard it



Six months, one shot



In August your investors turned down the first concept. Their note said it could be any beach hotel in the world. They are right, and it is fixable.



Saltbush Bronte is 24 keys over four levels, a 46-cover restaurant and a rooftop pool, built into the sandstone above the baths. Base build reaches practical completion on Monday 14 February 2028. Doors open three weeks later.

So the real brief is not a nicer moodboard. It is a concept the investment committee signs on 24 September, and long-lead orders placed the week after. If we have any of this wrong, tell us before you read on.

Four numbers run this project



Taken from your investor pack and the base-build programme. The third one decides everything else.




0



Keys, four levels


0



Weeks to opening


0 wk



Upholstery lead time


A$0.00m



FF&E budget, ex GST

Lead times set the date, not design



Supplier quotes we gathered in August for comparable hotel orders, and your FF&E budget split by area. Anything over 12 weeks must be ordered by 4 October.



Lead time by package, weeks

From order to delivery in Sydney

Lead time by package, weeks

FF&E budget by area, %

A$1.68m ex GST, 10% contingency held

Guest rooms
58 (58%)
Restaurant and bar
21 (21%)
Lobby and lounge
12 (12%)
Rooftop pool deck
9 (9%)

Route one: Quarry. We recommend it.

Honed Sydney sandstone on the walls, carved bedheads, ocean-green glazed tile in the baths. The room reads as cut from the headland. It is the only route investors cannot mistake for anywhere else, and the stone is quarried two hours away.


Quarry route: sandstone guest room

Route two: Tideline

Limewash walls in salt white, rope-wrapped timber, blue-green terrazzo floors. Calm and very good to sleep in. Our worry: it is the closest of the three to what investors already rejected.


Tideline route: limewash and terrazzo room

Route three: Ocean Pool

Built around the Bronte baths. Deep teal tile, chrome, white towelling, the bathroom as the room. The bravest route, with the highest FF&E risk: custom tile runs at 12 weeks.


Ocean Pool route: teal-tiled bathroom

The Quarry palette



Six materials, all specified with suppliers who can hit the October order. Sample box on your desk by Friday 17 September.



We have done fast openings before



Eleven people, founded 2019 by Odette Calloway and Rafe Thorne. Seven hotels opened, none late.



They placed our upholstery order before the developed design was finished, on a signed frame and fabric. Every sofa was on site eleven days before opening. Our previous fit-out missed by six weeks.

Tamsin Ward-Kelly

General Manager, Hotel Mirrabook, Byron Bay

Our board saw the rooms in VR, at full scale, three weeks after appointment. The concept was signed in one meeting. That has never happened to me in nineteen years of hotel development.

Hamish Ooi

Development Director, Corella Hotel Group

RevPAR was 18 percent above our forecast in the first six months. Guests book the stone rooms by name. We now charge a premium for them.

Lucia Ferrante

Owner, Alba House, Noosa

Order first, refine after



Normal sequence takes 30 weeks. You have 26. So the long-lead pieces are ordered on a signed frame and fabric while we finish the rest.



Concept signed, 24 September

Quarry route walked in VR at full scale with your investment committee. One sample box, one decision.

Long-lead orders, 4 October

Upholstery, joinery and lighting ordered on signed frames. You approve each order in the live FF&E tracker. Deposits are 40 percent and non-refundable.

Developed design, to 26 November

Elevations, RCP, lighting schedule and joinery details for all 24 keys, the restaurant and the roof.

Delivery, December to February

Goods consolidated at a bonded store in Botany and checked against the specification before they reach site.

Install and styling, from 14 February

Install in two weeks, snagging after. Styling and photography 1 to 3 March. Doors open 8 March.

Sign by Friday 10 September



This response holds until then. After that the October order date slips, and so does 8 March. Sign below and the VR model and sample box start on Monday.



Prepared by



Odette Calloway Co-founder and Creative Director, Calloway Thorne

Level 2, 48 Kippax Street Surry Hills NSW 2010 odette@callowaythorne.com.au

For approval by



Mereana Holt Development Director, Saltbush Hotels

We can walk the site at Bronte with you on Thursday 9 September if you would rather talk first.

Sign here
By approving this document, you sign it electronically.

Appoint Calloway Thorne for the concept stage

By signing, you appoint us for the concept stage at A$48,370 plus GST, from Monday 13 September to the investment committee on Friday 24 September 2027. The design fee for later stages, A$196,840 plus GST, and the A$1.68m FF&E budget paid to suppliers are approved separately at that meeting.