Take a peek inside Tanya and Vito's personality plus home

We take a tour of their real life house and get to know Tanya the artist. Bright, colourful and quirky, welcome to Tanya and Vito’s home!

“In my own home I have pops of colour and pops personality and a bold mix of old and new,” Tanya tells The Block Shop.

Throughout The Block, Melbourne couple Tanya and Vito have wowed the judges with their unique eclectic style.

Blending colours, eras, styles and designs, the pair have injected personality into every room to create a home that as judge Neal Whitaker says, simply can’t be ignored.

And that’s no surprise for Tanya and Vito – it’s what they’ve done in their own home already!

“In my own home I have pops of colour and pops personality and a bold mix of old and new,” Tanya says.

“It certainly has its own personality!”


It's a fun, colourful house! Tanya and Vito's gorgeous bedroom along with their dining table Tanya upcycled by getting it powder coated pink.

That style grew, Tanya says after she styled the family’s first homes in a more neutral way and found it just didn’t work for them.

“With the first two houses we lived in, I always knew we were going to sell them so I was a little bit safer because I knew that my style not be for everybody,” Tanya says.

“But in in the second house that we built I went for a French Provincial feel and it didn't feel like me at all so what I did was I styled it with lots of vibrant colours.

“Then when we sold the home the lady who bought it said she didn't buy it for the French Provincial style, she bought it because of the way I’d styled it and she wanted to buy the furniture and styling items with the house… and we did!

“So, when we build our third home, I thought you know what I've got the confidence now, clearly what I'm doing is working, so I'm going to just make this home my own!”

Visitors to the family’s Melbourne home are immediately hit by the pops of colour Tanya mentioned, from the Watermelon Pink front door to the Teal cabinetry in the kitchen over pick cabinet with terrazzo island benchtop, teal tiles in the powder room with a coral basin and again, terrazzo, this time on the floor.

“Terrazzo isn't for everybody but we love it because it gives us that mid-century feel but it's also really great for homes because maintenance is really low and it's also a great base to use for colour because it's speckled so when you add a pop of colour it really lifts,” Tanya says.


Tanya and Vito's family home kitchen featuring teal cabinetry.


We spy the same benchtop in Tanya and Vito's home that they featured in their Block kitchen. "Terrazzo isn't for everybody but we love it because it gives us that mid-century feel but it's also really great for homes because maintenance is really low."

“This time around I was a bit more fearless with my choices and didn't care so much what others would think, I just made the space our own!”

And just like her Block home, Tanya’s real home features her own artworks, a mix of abstract and natural, she says, that are not so much pictures of anything, but “more a feeling, a vibe”.

“I've been painting since I was a toddler but I never intended to go into The Block thinking that I would create artwork it just seemed to happen,” Tanya says.

“I didn't think I would have the time and to be honest with you I really didn't, but at the time it kind of felt like what my soul needed because there was so much drama going on that it was a way for me to escape and reset so it was really therapeutic as well as a way to add a little piece of me into the home.”

Borrowing from her childhood and her cultural roots, Tanya’s says her artworks often feature “a mixture of shapes and nature with colour clashes”, pairing brown with a pink or a green with a coral or more.


We love their colourful bathrooms! Teal tiles in the powder room with a coral basin and again, terrazzo, this time on the floor.

“I also use a lot of references to gardens that I grew up with and my Italian Heritage like they'll be some cactus there, or flowers that I remember as a child,” she says.

“There's one piece in particular in the hallway of our Block house where I imagined water with a bit of a sunset but mixed in with some floral ribbony style patterns, I just it was just what I felt that room needs.”

They are, as the judges have pointed out, unique, quirky and eclectic… “And bold!” Tanya says.



Tanya pictured in her own art room with her daughter Eva.

Tanya’s top five style tips:

1. Turn up the colour: By all means have a base of white, we’ve got white walls and white tiles in a bathroom, but it’s the pops of colour that really stand out and make a statement.

2. Be yourself: Creativity and design is not copying something off Pinterest it's asking what is my style, what makes me happy and what how can I express that through my house?

3. Embrace nature: Use natural products like timber or terrazzo or even a crazy pave brick, different layering of textures I think can be really, really, beautiful.

4. Know your period: Pick a time or an area that you really love and appreciate and run with that. But don't be afraid to mix that era with something really modern as well.

5. Shop outside the square: Don't be afraid to go to Op Shop or a vintage market and find something that no one else will have. One or two pieces that draw from the area that suits you a style can really make a difference.

Plenty of LOVE for the Gucci gang! Thank you for inviting The Block Shop into your stunning family home!

Shop Tanya's art HERE



Borrowing from her childhood and her cultural roots, Tanya’s says her artworks often feature “a mixture of shapes and nature with colour clashes”, pairing brown with a pink or a green with a coral or more.


For more on Tanya and Vito and to take a closer look at their revealed Block rooms HERE