Ultra-luxury apartment to be built on site of iconic Australian beach shack fetches $24 million!

The bulls are running wild in once dirty-as-anything Burleigh Heads

A few years back, a pretty little wooden beach shack on the top of the hill at Burleigh Heads there, not quite overlooking the Cove but only a few steps from the vista, sold for seven million dollars, almost two-and-a-half mill more than it sold for in 2016.

The little beach shack at number 10 Goodwin Terrace was built in 1920 at and typical of the period, was elevated to snatch northerly breezes, a covered wrap-around balcony to shelter from the pretty damn relentless Gold Coast sun.

The land was zoned medium density, a three-storey, fifty-feet feet height limit, which meant the developer wasn’t able to toss a tower on the land, even if developers have been known to work many behind-the-scenes miracles.

The developer, Spyre Group, described the location and the subsequent build thus, 

A parcel of land so rare insisted on an architectural response like no other, a location engulfed in the most impressive collection of natural inspirations granted the freedom to design the impossible.

Glasshouse is an architectural response that captures and amplifies the qualities of such an extraordinary place – something that was as distinctive and rare as the site itself. It’s an offering stridently new to not only Burleigh Heads, but the South East Coast entirely. 

Every aspect of Glasshouse is a triumph – from the breathtaking individuality of living environments to the authenticity of stone materials and the skill of the artisans’ craft. Sculptural island benches and bathroom vanities forged in the finest Italian stone serve both in function and statement. 

Two of three have been combined to create a ten-thousand square feet apartment that has just sold for twenty-four mill, four mill more than for the building’s single penthouse, which sold last year. 

“You are quite elevated and your view is like floating into the waves, the rock pools at the front, and the lit-up city in the background,” the selling agent told the property press.

Once one of the grittier parts of the Gold Coast, third in shittiness behind Coolangatta and perennial winner Palm Beach, Burleigh Heads has been transformed into a paradise for investors, including the Chinese man who bought the Old Burleigh Theatre Arcade, the former home of Surfing Life magazine, for eighteen-mill.

Your ol pal DR deeply regrets selling his mid-century masterpiece next door, which had a gun-barrel view of the Cove, for a little under six hundred a decade ago.