Project managers who came up through the trade.

Twenty-five years on the tools.

Australian-qualified — Certificate IV in Building and Construction and Certificate IV in Building Design — IMPIC-licensed in Portugal, and the person who carries out every inspection personally. Those are two separate qualifications, on both sides of the job: one to build it, one to design it. It means the drawings get read properly rather than glanced at, which matters on an inspection, where a fair share of the problems come from what was designed badly in the first place rather than what was built badly.

Bradley started his carpentry and building apprenticeship in Sydney in 2001 and has been in construction ever since. The work has covered both sides of the industry — residential new homes and renovations, and commercial construction — a broader base than most inspectors bring to a property. He ran his own building business in Australia for five years before moving to Portugal, where he and Mafalda set up Antipodean.

In between came London, working on high-end fit-outs, including One Hyde Park — one of the most demanding residential projects built in the city. Fit-out at that level is where you learn what a proper finish actually is, and how far most work falls short of it. It’s the standard he still measures against.

Alongside the building, Bradley spent years in project management in the events and staging industry, including world touring with Madonna and a number of other major shows. Touring is the hardest programme management there is: the date is fixed and immovable, you build and strike in a matter of days, there’s no second attempt, and everything has to be sequenced to the hour. It’s where the scheduling side of how he runs a job came from — and it’s why a build programme with real dates on it isn’t an unusual request here.

That mix is the point. Residential and commercial means he’s seen how buildings go together at every scale. High-end fit-out means he knows what good actually looks like. Touring means he can run a programme. And twenty-five years of fixing what other people got wrong means that when he tells you what a defect will cost to put right, it’s because he’s priced and repaired it himself.

Design that survives the build.

Portuguese, born and raised in Porto, and trained at Central Saint Martins in London — one of the leading design schools in the world — where she took her Master’s in Industrial Design. She brings a background in interior design and construction management to every project we take on. Twelve years managing sites in Australia and Portugal means she’s not a designer who hands over drawings and disappears; she’s on site while it’s built, which is why the detail survives contact with the trades.

That combination is rare here. Most people renovating in Portugal are choosing between a designer who doesn’t understand construction and a builder who doesn’t understand design. Mafalda is both, in both languages.

• Interior design & layouts
• Finishes, joinery & lighting
• Design consultancy & second opinions
• Specification for tender
• On-site design management
• Portuguese & English throughout

Local knowledge on one side, outside standards on the other.

Bradley brings Australian and British building standards to a Portuguese market. Mafalda brings native Portuguese, the local trade network and the design eye. Between them the link between decisions, details and execution stays intact — and you always know who’s responsible for what.

Antipodean operates independently. No commissions, no referral arrangements, no conflicts. The only party paying us is you.