In the leafy suburbs of Melbourne, on an ordinary street, sits an ordinary house. There is no signage or nurses’ station. But inside, 10 older Australians sit down together for a home-cooked lunch, prepared by a live-in housekeeper who also checks in on their wellbeing. 

This is Abbeyfield. It’s not a retirement village or aged care. Instead, it’s a 70-year-old international movement – offering housing, companionship, and dignity to older people who can’t afford the alternatives. 

“I’d never heard of Abbeyfield either,” CEO Dimitri Kiriacoulacos, who first encountered the charity as a young lawyer in Adelaide in the late ‘90s, told SATURDAY. “But once you get inside one of our houses, you see how powerful this model really is.” 

Normal homes, uncommon purpose 

Abbeyfield’