JAMES Tutton's interest in property started early - as a primary school pupil at Preshil School in Kew.
"There was this feudal ownership of the cubbyhouses," he laughs.
"By hook or by crook, I had rule over six cubbyhouses out of 10 in the school!"
An entrepreneur and businessman, Tutton is best known for starting the hugely successful Moonlight Cinema with just $5000 in 1996, when he was 24.
A decade on and after expansion to Sydney, Perth and Brisbane and into cinema advertising, Tutton and business partner Mark McCoach sold Moonlight Cinema for $8.3million.
After a few years working in the US, Tutton decided to get out of the entertainment industry and turn his hand to property. He chose Neometro - a luxury architectural developer known for its high-design inner-city apartments.
Tutton says he's always had a toe in property. He bought his first house in Peel Street, Windsor, in 1995 and then spent his 20s buying, renovating and selling inner-city properties.
He had worked on projects with Neometro director Jeff Provan in the past, and signed up as co-director last January.
"I was looking to start a new career and he was looking for a partner who could really take the business to the next level," Tutton says. "That's not to say we will incessantly grow it, but we will keep the same qualities and the DNA of the design and what the brand stands for."
Branding is one of Tutton's passions, and it is one of the main reasons he was attracted to Neometro.
"I love what we design and build, so I think there is a personal commitment to it," he says.
"I think Neometro occupies a unique position. We build almost everything ourselves, so there is a consistency of quality and as such, you build a brand and people know what they are getting.
"If you create something in a physical sense that can be differentiated and there is a brand associated with it, people will ultimately appreciate that and understand the value they get from that."
Tutton says the same logic was applied to Moonlight Cinema. In the decade he ran the business, he knew of 12 competitors who started up, only to fail.
He says Neometro and Moonlight appeal to a similar profile of consumer-sophisticated urbanites who care about culture.
But he admits he misses the showmanship of the entertainment business.
"You could turn up on a Saturday night at our venue in Perth and there were 3000 people there on a beautiful summer night," he says.
"There is inherently a real buzz, and that is fantastic. Whereas with property you don't get that - but there is a wonderful attraction to building something which is aesthetically beautiful and will be there in 50 to 100 years time."
Tutton is in the midst of building his own house on his Mornington Peninsula farm for his wife and two children.
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