I just got off the phone to dad, and all I can say is… wow. Who knew the guy was capable of getting so utterly swept up in kitchen design concepts? He just spent about forty minutes reeling off his predictions for the upcoming winter’s hit trends, and which ones he’s thinking of applying to his and mum’s holiday home. I’m pretty overwhelmed, to say the least.

So, what’s he got in mind? Well, for starters, he wants a bespoke larder. These, apparently, are where it’s at in 2019. Gone are the days of the off-the-rack storage solutions; we’re talking custom built, temperature controlled units. According to dad, these may appear rustic to an untrained eye – painted, perhaps, in the colour of the season for kitchens: a rich blue-green tone reminiscent of algae.

I didn’t realise it was going to be this big of a production when my parents announced they were going to start compiling kitchen renovation ideas. Melbourne friends, do your folks carry on like this? I’m sure mum is egging dad on, although the bulk of his motivation seems to be coming from some untapped corner of his own psyche.

Thank god he’s starting to get over his thing for feature taps and single-slab splashbacks – those details seem far less consequential that custom storage, for example, or the overall colour scheme. Don’t even get me started on his whole ‘broken-plan living’ lingo – the guy’s clearly read one too many Designer Living magazines.

Worryingly, though, he did ask me if I knew of a good bathroom renovator. Melbourne has those in abundance, and I do happen to know one personally, but I’m not going to be contributing to dad’s reno mania. He seems to be keeping it adequately fuelled on his own enthusiasm, so why feed into it?

My one concession to adding my two cents was suggesting that they look into new-fangled ways of concealing appliances. If they want to go with this ‘rustic grande’ look, they can’t very well have their high-tech blender on display, can they?