Musical theatre star Chelsea Gibb lists off-grid Surf Coast farmhouse
Musical theatre and television star Chelsea Gibb is bringing down the curtain on her family’s off-grid country home in the Surf Coast hinterland.
The Moriac-based performer and her husband, free-range farmer Hayden Findlay, are selling their contemporary sustainable farmhouse to pursue bigger pastures.
Gibb is best known for playing the lead role in Chicago in four-year run across Australia and South East Asia.
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The six-bedroom house has grid independence thanks to a solar system with a 32kW battery and an automated back-up generator.
Chelsea Gibb in Cabaret in 2017.
She has a string of other musical theatre credits to her name, as well as appearances in All Saints and the George of the Jungle 2 movie.
In recent years, the versatile leading lady has turned her hand to farming at the couple’s 16.59ha property.
A six-bedroom, solar passive house with sweeping rural views is the centrepiece of the much-loved rural sanctuary located about 15 minutes from the outskirts of Geelong.
The farm, listed for $4.4m through Maxwell Collins, Geelong agent Laura Vander Noord, also includes a multipurpose venue with an industrial kitchen formerly used as a cafe.
The recycled brick wall creates a thermal mass in the open-plan living room.
“Hayden designed the whole thing himself, he’s very clever,” Gibb said.
“It’s off-grid so we don’t have any bills at all … and it’s the luxury life of not being too far away from everything.
“For us, we just needed some more land. Hayden’s got bigger dreams with the regenerative farming.”
Burnished concrete floors and a recycled brick wall feature in home’s main living pavilion, which showcases north-facing views over a mature river red gum tree.
Other highlights includes a private walled courtyard with an outdoor bath and shower off the main bedroom suite and an automated off-grid solar system that keeps the lights on.
The property’s river red gum is never far from view.
The house is sited to maximise the northern orientation.
Gibb said the couple had five children between them, but future proofed the design with removable internal walls that have enabled them to reclaim bedrooms now some have left the nest.
“We have a sauna room, a gym room and a study, plus three children’s bedrooms and a spare room,” she said.
But it’s possibly the oversized walk-in pantry and organic strawberry patch that she will miss the most.
“We are very privileged out here to have this gorgeous life, I would struggle to live in Melbourne now,” she said.
