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The South Jakarta suburb of Bintaro is a quiet residential area dotted with freshly painted houses, where dappled white goats can still be found gnawing at the hedges. It offers easy access to Central Jakarta and a tranquil environment, which is largely why Jakarta architect Jessica Sundojo and her banker husband David decided to build their house there.

Situated within the Puri Bintaro complex, their house is made from natural stones in light shades of oatmeal, wintry grays and off-whites.

Although the young couple had thought about purchasing a ready-made house, 26-year-old Jessica undertook the task of designing their home because she dislikes houses that look the same — the norm in housing complexes such as Bintaro.

“I don’t want to go home and be confused. I want my house to be different,” said Jessica, who formerly worked for leading Sydney-based architectural firm Allen Jack+Cottier Architects.

Jessica, who began sketching her dream house while she was still studying architecture at Sydney’s University of New South Wales, was able to have the structure completed within eight months. The result is a simple and modern tropical house, more on the minimalist side, where the furnishings, color and house structure complement each other well.

“Friends come here and say the house looks like me,” laughed the slim and elegant architect, who also models for fashion spreads. The house consists of two levels, with brick walls and marble flooring. The main door is carved out of pure timber and the sizable O-shaped silver door handle, sliced by a line in the middle, was designed by the couple.

“We wanted the focus to [be] the timber, not the handle,” said Jessica, who found the handles for sale too overpowering.

Highlighting the entrance like a beautiful mat is a rectangular slab of brown and terra-cotta onyx leading into the open area, where the pantry space blends into the sitting room. The island in the kitchen uses a mix of sand-colored Ujung Pandang marble and sable granite.

A small interior courtyard with a pond filled with large koi is visible from within the house through a set of glass doors, which pivot onto the rectangular pond, and serves as the focal point of the house.

“I wanted the garden to surround the house. That’s why it’s U-shaped. You don’t have to go out to see the garden,” Jessica said.

The property has a airy feel to it. Light pervades the house from the lofty glass doors and windows, while double-height ceilings void around the central living room space.

The driveway leading to a one-car garage is kept open yet shaded with a sunlit canopy to protect incoming or outgoing passengers from rainfall.

“I don’t like dark houses,” Jessica said. “If it’s dark, it saps the energy.”

Jessica and her husband wanted the house to be more of a retreat, which is why it looks like a villa, she said.

“We just wanted our home to be more relaxed,” she said.

The staircase is made of wood. “I don’t want stairs out of concrete because it makes the house heavy,” Jessica said.

The upper level is kept unadorned, with lofty 3.2-meter ceilings to give an impression of space to the compact 300-square-meter house.

To maximize open space and use as few doors as possible, Jessica had combined a semi-walk-in closet within the marbled main bathroom. “I didn’t want too many doors in the house. It would make it look too small,” she said.

The bathrooms are softly lit by under lighting below the sink, while showers are simply designed with taupe colored tiles and pebbles.

From the mini-balcony in the couple’s bedroom, the pond and garden scattered with low-maintenance plants such as iris, mission grass and tabebuia, are visible.

Furnishings are a mix of contemporary furniture and polished personal touches, such as the identically constructed HPL (high pressure laminate) wooden doors. Jessica added in a singular vertical silver stripe as the sole adornment.

“HPL looks cheap,” Jessica said. “The silver [stripe] gives a nicer look to the door. Otherwise it’s too plain.”

Behind the open-space family room is floor-to-ceiling storage cleverly concealed by sliding doors, serving as a wall.

The couple has a soft spot for natural stone. Marble with a sprinkled-sand motif was chosen for the ground floor, while plainer man-made granite tile covers the second floor. The outer walls of the garden have softness to them from the tinge of peach of natural stones from New Zealand.

Concerning the front room by the entrance, Jessica intends to transform it into a workspace to serve the dual function of being a study and a guest room to greet clients. A long-term planner, she already foresees working from home when children enter the picture.

They moved in only three months ago, and though there are unframed pre-wedding portraits of the couple in various areas of Sydney, most walls are still bare.

Jessica’s next project — to create a homier feel to the home — involves creating an acrylic painting to place on the walls. “Maybe an abstract,” she said. With her very realistic ideas of what she wants, it’s just a matter of time.

To contact Jessica Sundojo:
PT Parama Dharma
Jl KH Ahmad Dahlan 69 A-B
JKT 12130
Tel: 021 725 3008