As Styled By - Sacha Wark-de Boer

Meet Sacha, founder of Opal & Oak, a Southern Highlands–based interior design studio known for creating homes that feel deeply personal, timeless and effortlessly liveable. Through her thoughtful approach to design, Sacha helps clients move beyond fleeting trends and create spaces that reflect their own story, lifestyle and sense of home.

For The Atelier Project, a family home in the Southern Highlands NSW, Sacha crafted a home rich in warmth, texture and character, balancing refined details with everyday functionality. As part of the project, she incorporated two of our Evie Bedsides, one styled beside the lounge in the living room and another in the master bedroom, showcasing the versatility of a piece that feels equally at home beyond the bedroom.

We spoke with Sacha about the vision behind The Atelier, her thoughts on designing timeless interiors, and why the Evie Bedside was the perfect fit for the space.

To start, we'd love to hear about your recent The Atelier Project. What was the overall vision, and what did the clients want to create in their Southern Highlands home?

The house needed to feel colourful and inspiring, whilst not being too ‘in your face’. Each room needed to feel unique but also sing together as a whole, in harmony. This home is small and bold, and there was no intent to make any of the rooms feel bigger, just better and intentionally creative. Throughout the home you will see lots of details with character, honest materials and vintage touches to make the home feel layered and lived-in, rather than a catalogue.

You often speak about creating homes that tell someone's own story rather than following trends. How does that philosophy shape your approach, and how do you guide clients toward choices that feel truly personal and that they'll still love in ten years?

For me, it’s all about how the people who live in the home function within the spaces. If you love a white boucle sofa, regardless of its trend, but you are a family of five and have 2 dogs, then I would shy away from said sofa, or at least find a more suitable option that they will still love. Telling people’s personal stories is understanding how they want to feel within the space, as well as physically move throughout the space, that’s often far more important than if they do or do not like the colour blue, or whether or not something is on trend. A well put-together interior is all about layering with intention and designing for the life lived within it in mind. 

Honest materials are also very important to me, regardless of trend. You’ll see that quick fleeting furniture moments are often made from cheap materials, trying to be something they’re not. Walnut timber is having a moment, and will last a lifetime if made from quality materials and paired with other complementing furniture pieces. We cannot necessarily avoid leaving a date stamp on what we like today as most of the things we buy today are shaped by today’s trends, but quality materials will always remain important. 

For The Atelier Project, you used our Evie Bedsides in both the living room and the master bedroom. What drew you to this piece, and how does it fit into your thinking around timeless furniture choices?

I was drawn in by the Rekindle Design Co pieces in general because they show beautiful characteristics and are made from solid materials: both of those points are very aligned with the Opal & Oak vision and brands that we like to use in our projects. The Evie in particular was great from a looks, as well as a practical point of view: In the master bedroom there isn’t a lot of space, and the client didn’t want to compromise on their king size bed, so we therefore looked at smaller bedside table options. With only being 40cm wide, and having a drawer for extra storage, this was the perfect fit (literally) for this room. On the other side of the bed we opted for a small floating shelf, as the second bedside table ended up looking perfect next to the lounge instead: a nice creative discovery during install. If it was in the corner next to the bed, it would have just been sitting there tucked away, whereas now it’s creating a beautiful vignette when entering the living room, complementing the cottage feel against the panelled wall. 

Finally, for anyone who'd love to work with you on their own home, what does that process look like, and where can people find you?

At Opal & Oak we work with clients across Sydney, the South Coast of NSW, the ACT as well as The Southern Highlands. I like being able to visit my clients in their homes, rather than doing digital consultations, so that radius works really well for us. I always start the process with an in-home consultation. There, we can address some of the clients' issues and I can get a good picture of the project at hand, as well as what is currently working for them or not working. From there, we work in 3 phases: conceptualisation, realisation, and installation. Digital concepts first, working towards the final concept that the clients love. Then, we move into identifying tangible furniture pieces, joinery and materials such as flooring, tiles etc. Installation is the final piece to the puzzle: this is where everything that we have been working on comes to life, in real life!

People can contact us via design@opalandoak.com.au, via our website www.opalandoak.com.au or Instagram DMs. 

Photography credit: 

Featured as part of our 'As Styled By' series, celebrating the spaces touched by Rekindle Design Co. pieces.