Clemence Harvey is the kind of person who sets the standard rather than follows it. When she brings together Melbourne's most discerning creatives, editors, and tastemakers for a black tie evening, the event doesn't just need to be good. It needs to feel unmistakably like her.

The venue was Clemence's discovery: a private Fitzroy residence with soaring ceilings and an art collection brought from Italy by aristocrats fleeing Mussolini's regime, once owned by Melbourne's iconic restaurateur Mietta, and at another point in its history, an illegal gay club. The space had layers. But it was not a venue. It had never been set up as one. That was ours to solve.

A private residence gives you no infrastructure to work with: no threshold moment, no natural flow, no reveal. We designed all three. Arriving at an unassuming door on a Fitzroy street, guests were met with clever lighting and writing on mirrors that created intrigue before they'd taken another step. The ballerinas weren't staged performers waiting for their cue. They moved through the space as quiet presences, almost like fairies, before revealing the dining room in a moment no one had been expecting.

Every decision inside the space was made with the same deliberateness. The existing art collection was edited rather than replaced: the pieces that spoke to the evening stayed, the rest were cleared, and fallen chandeliers placed where they felt inevitable. The open kitchen put the chefs at the centre of the atmosphere rather than behind it. Sky High Trio's improvised soundscape set the tone without ever announcing itself. Nothing about the experience announced itself. It was simply felt.

The result was an evening that felt like it could only have existed once, in that room, on that night.