Good design has a way of disappearing into the landscape it inhabits: a path curves exactly where you'd expect it to, a chair sits precisely where the afternoon light falls. It's an idea B&B Italia has now built an entire showroom around.
Beyond the threshold, rethinking the outdoor space
The brand's new Surry Hills space, its first anywhere in the world devoted solely to outdoor product, treats furniture as part of the architecture, designed with the same rigour, craftsmanship and permanence as anything you'd bring inside the home.
That's been Secret Gardens' guiding principle for more than three decades. Established in Sydney in 1994, the studio's team of landscape architects, construction specialists and horticulturists build every project around three questions: the who, the where and the why, treating each client, brief, site and climate as its own set of challenges.
The opening of B&B Italia's outdoor showroom makes for a timely conversation, as outdoor furniture is held to the same design standard as its indoor counterpart. Garden designers are increasingly being asked to think about outdoor rooms with the same comfort and permanence as the interiors they sit beside and to treat furniture as something closer to architecture than accessory.
We sat down with Creative Director Matthew Cantwell of Secret Gardens to talk design ethos, the growing role furniture plays in shaping a landscape, and the studio's forthcoming book, Secret Gardens: Private Realms.
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More Space: How would you describe the Secret Gardens design ethos?
Matt Cantwell: We want to create landscapes that feel genuinely connected to how people live. Every garden begins with the belief that it should feel inevitable, as though it couldn't exist anywhere else.
There's a common thread across our work: a search for simplicity, permanence and atmosphere. We want a garden to reveal itself slowly rather than announce itself. The best gardens are layered, they reward familiarity and grow richer over time. Ultimately, our work is about creating private realms: places of refuge, connection and belonging.
More Space: Before a single plant or piece of furniture is chosen, what are the first questions you ask a client?
Matt Cantwell: How do people want to feel in the space? How do they live, gather, entertain? What memories of gardens have stayed with them? We also want to understand the architecture and the history of the site, the garden isn't an object beside a house, it's part of a bigger story. Only once we understand that do we move to materiality, furniture and planting.
'We want to create landscapes that feel genuinely connected to how people live. Every garden begins with the belief that it should feel inevitable, as though it couldn't exist anywhere else.'
Matthew Cantwell, Creative Director of Secret Gardens
More Space: Is there a non-negotiable in your process, something you won't compromise on?
Matt Cantwell: Restraint. There's always pressure to add more, another feature, another material. Often, the strongest decision is what to leave out. We're also uncompromising about coherence: every element, hard landscaping, planting, furniture, should belong to one conversation, not compete. A successful garden feels calm because every decision supports the whole.
More Space: B&B Italia's new showroom makes the case that outdoor furniture deserves the same design rigour as anything indoors. Australian homes are also increasingly blurring the line between indoor and outdoor living. How has that changed the way you think about outdoor rooms, and the furniture within them?
Matt Cantwell: It's changed everything about the brief. Outdoor rooms are no longer an afterthought to the house, they're expected to hold the same weight, somewhere you'd genuinely want to sit with a coffee or host a long lunch, not just walk through. That means furniture has to do more work. It's not simply functional; it's what signals to a person that this is a room, that they're invited to stay rather than pass through. The right piece, placed well, is often what convinces someone to actually use a space they'd otherwise just look at.
More Space: B&B Italia's new showroom treats outdoor furniture with the rigour of interior product, and its European sensibility meets a looser, climate-driven Australian one. What do you make of that dialogue?
Matt Cantwell: What struck me was seeing outdoor furniture treated with the same sophistication as interior pieces, the emphasis clearly on design and longevity, not lifestyle marketing. That dialogue is what makes it compelling. European design brings discipline and craftsmanship; Australia brings a relaxed relationship with landscape and light. The best projects don't imitate either; they combine the precision of one with an understanding of the other. Good design should always feel rooted in its place.
More Space: Walking through a showroom built entirely around outdoor product raises the question: what makes a piece of outdoor furniture feel truly integrated into a landscape, rather than simply placed within it? Can furniture actually shape the architecture of a garden, the way it shapes the experience of an interior?
Matt Cantwell: Integration comes from restraint again; a piece that respects the proportions and materiality of what's around it, rather than competing for attention. When that's right, furniture stops being an object you've added and starts reading as part of the composition, almost like it grew there.
And yes, it can absolutely shape the architecture, not just furnish it. We've had projects where a single considered piece, its scale, its orientation, has determined how a whole terrace or courtyard is laid out, where the paving falls, where a pergola needs to sit to frame it properly. Furniture, done well, defines movement through a space in the same way a wall or a hedge does. It's rarely just decoration.
More Space: Given brands like B&B Italia are now designing outdoor furniture to indoor standards, what do you look for in materials, given the conditions an Australian garden puts them through?
Matt Cantwell: Intense UV, salt air, wind and heat test materials quickly. We look for things that age with dignity rather than resist weathering: natural stone, quality timber, marine-grade metals. Furniture should become part of the landscape's composition. Longevity is about remaining visually relevant for decades, not just holding up.
'Furniture should become part of the landscape's composition. Longevity is about remaining visually relevant for decades, not just holding up.'
Matthew Cantwell, Creative Director of Secret Gardens
More Space: Tell us about the upcoming book.
Matt Cantwell: Private Realms invites readers inside 20 of Australia's most beautiful personal gardens, from waterfronts to rural acres, each intimate and completely its own. It's less a catalogue than an exploration of why gardens matter. The timing feels right, the practice has reached a mature body of work, and there's growing appreciation of gardens as essential to architecture, not just its surroundings.
More Space: What's exciting you about outdoor design in Australia right now?
Matt Cantwell: A growing confidence, reinforced by visits to California, where our peers look to us for inspiration. There's a deeper understanding that outdoor spaces are fundamental to how we live, not an afterthought, and a greater appreciation for native planting, considered furniture, and designing for longevity over fashion.