HOW BUTTERFLY LANE WAS BORN - A BIG DREAM TO A TINY REALITY
In 2022, Chris and Kat left a small 1-bedroom flat in Bondi and set out on an adventure to Mullumbimby.
There wasn’t much more of a plan, except a comment from Chris asking if they could raise their children outdoors and live next to a mountain. Funny how life delivers - with what they actually wanted, and how they wanted to raise their two girls. City life had been good, but they had found a piece of land at the base of Mount Chincogan, five minutes outside Mullumbimby in the Byron Shire hinterland, that felt right. The sort that doesn't require much explaining once you've stood on it.
They fell in love with it quickly. The way the mountain sits right on your doorstep. The quality of the light at different times of day. The feeling, when you're there, that the rest of the world has slowed down without you having to do anything about it. They wanted their daughters to grow up knowing what that felt like.
A friendship and a conversation
In 2024, Chris and Kat met Josh. He came out to visit, and what happened - as tends to happen on good land — was one of those long, easy conversations that doesn't really end. About what they had here. About whether it was the kind of thing other people should be allowed to experience too.
An inheritance spent differently
Around the same time, Josh's stepfather passed away. He had been an adventurer — a photographer, a hiker, an artist. The kind of person who moved through the world with curiosity and didn't stay still for long. He left Josh some money. The sensible move was a deposit on a flat in Sydney, but sensible felt boring. Josh chose Butterfly Lane instead.
It's hard to explain and easy to understand. His stepfather would have loved this place. He would have hiked Mount Chincogan before breakfast and spent the evening at a fire pit with a beer, no particular plan for the morning. Building something here - something that invited people to slow down, look up, and actually be somewhere — felt like the better way to honour him. And the better way to use the money.
Building it properly
The three of them set about doing it right. They found Alphaline, a tiny home builder (they also build Unyoked’s cabins), and spent a long time getting the design exactly as they wanted it. The brief was specific: completely off-grid, but without sacrificing the things that make a stay feel special. A luxury space that happened to be powered by the sun and watered by the mountain.
Guests have since described the aesthetic as "Scandanese" — a Scandinavian-Japanese minimalist blend — which is a word we'll happily adopt. Every detail was considered. The pendant lighting, the handmade coffee setup, the deep soaking bath positioned to look straight up at Mount Chincogan. Small things that add up to a feeling.
Going fully off-grid had its challenges (more about that in our blog post here). The solar system needed upgrading from the outset. New batteries. An additional water pump to draw from the aquifer that sits 40 metres beneath the mountain. Each problem had a solution; each solution made the place more resilient and more itself. The tiny home was delivered in September 2024. The first guests arrived in October.
What happened next
In the eighteen months or so since, we've hosted hundreds of people and have over 60 5-star reviews across Airbnb, Riparide and booking.com (We still pinch ourselves at that figure!).
The reviews, the messages, the handwritten notes guests leave on the table when they check out — they don't get old. People write about the outdoor bath at midnight. About not picking up their phone for a full two days. About feeling, when they drive back up the dirt track and rejoin the main road, like something has been properly reset.
We've kept building too. The outdoor decking. The outdoor fire pit area. Bits and pieces refined along the way, because caring about the detail doesn't stop once the doors open.
We've also formed relationships with local producers to stock what we call the Tiny Honesty System — a small selection of things we've tried and genuinely love, available to guests on trust. Beers from Wandana Brewery. Kombucha from Good Good Happy. Chocolate from Loco Love. Incense from Dutchie Scents. It's a small thing, but it matters to us — a way of keeping the experience rooted in this particular place and the people making good things in it (check out our locals guide here.)
(In true Byron Shire style, we all celebrated Butterfly Lane’s 1 year anniversary in glitter, sequences and smiles).
Butterfly Lane wasn’t mapped out in advance. It started with a piece of land that felt special, a friendship, an inheritance that pointed somewhere unexpected, and a shared dream that this was worth doing well - we think it still is.
If you want to come and see for yourself, bookings are open here.