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Although the sideboard has traditional style, the blue paint gives it a fresh, updated look, as do the bright green gourd lamps and the starburst mirror. But it’s primarily the yellow wallpaper that gives the room its cheerful personality. The traditional paneled molding beneath provides a balance.Sideboard: Hickory Chair; wallpaper: Thibaut
For this family, maximizing their time outdoors with a living space was essential. “They enjoy spending time outside and in the water,” Murphy says. “Not only do the living room and kitchen open to the outdoors, so does the master suite.” (The children’s bedrooms are upstairs.) “They really wanted the focal point of the house, from the inside, to be the water and woods beyond.”Browse more homes by style:Apartments | Barn Homes | Colorful Homes | Contemporary Homes | Eclectic Homes | Farmhouses | Floating Homes | Guesthouses | Homes Around the World | Lofts | Midcentury Homes | Modern Homes | Ranch Homes | Small Homes | Townhouses | Traditional Homes | Transitional Homes | Vacation Homes
When the couple began having children, the den (in a corner of the house next to the dining room and master bedroom) became essential for reading, playing games and quiet time. “This was the last room in the house to be designed,” Murphy says. Because the exterior roofline came down into the space, “we came up with a stepped-down ceiling design that rises up again in the middle, to organize the room.” The built-in bookcases have the same board background as the backsplash in the laundry room.
Doors in the master bedroom open to the pool area. The hand-carved white limestone fireplace sits back-to-back with the fireplace in the living room. An overlay panel in the bed niche is “very French and provides a sense of coziness,” Murphy says, as the ceiling vaults up above the fireplace. Built-in bookcases keep storage simple and organized. The walls are painted a soft gray that has a touch of muted French blue.
The open-plan living room and kitchen open directly to the outdoors. A fireplace of hand-carved white limestone nestles into a corner. Murphy and his team designed storage along the paneled wall to artfully house the homeowner’s extensive collection of audiovisual electronics. The beams in the vaulted ceiling are reclaimed alder stained a deep walnut color. They are a stunning point of interest in the otherwise creamy room.
For the clients’ daughter, Vargas designed a magical little-girl’s room. The Restoration Hardware bed is a hybrid model that converts from a crib to a twin-size. In keeping with the window treatments in the rest of the house, the canopy is a lightweight cotton. The window treatments are true blackout draperies; eliminating light leakage helps the little one sleep through the night. Browse more homes by style: Apartments | Barn Homes | Colorful Homes | Contemporary Homes | Eclectic Homes | Farmhouses | Floating Homes | Guesthouses | Homes Around the World | Lofts | Midcentury Homes | Modern Homes | Ranch Homes | Small Homes | Townhouses | Traditional Homes | Transitional Homes | Vacation Homes
The master bedroom is anchored by a beautiful vintage screen purchased at a Pasadena flea market. The screen was hidden in a dusty corner of the vendor’s booth when Vargas happened upon it, and he knew that once it was cleaned up and restored, it would be perfect for his clients’ home. When Vargas says, “If you have one great piece, you don’t need a thousand things in the space,” this is the type of piece he’s referring to. All the bedrooms in the home are outfitted with stock wool carpet cut to fit and then bound with felt.
In the breakfast room, a wrought-iron light fixture has a span of nearly 5 feet and holds 16 candles. The monolithic, precast-stone table beneath it is actually a patio table that complements the luxuriousness of the Ebanista chairs around it. The artwork in this space is a testament to the power of cleverly arranging affordable art. The Parisian maps hung in a grid are humble reproductions, purchased at the Louvre museum gift shop for a total of $100.
The dining room features a custom table made with hardwood parquet floor panels left over from another of the designer’s projects. Surrounding it are chic accent chairs from one of the homeowners’ childhood homes.
Painting the walls white allowed the designer to keep the focus on the home’s traditional ironwork, original carved wood beams and Spanish tile on the stairs.
Vargas and his team used vintage-inspired Spanish Colonial pieces whenever possible, and since this look can often be visually weighty and dark, they enforced an airy palette through their selection of fabrics. The custom white wool area rug in the living room features an expanded Moorish pattern, scaled up for a more contemporary look.
Vargas selected furniture with classic lines that would reflect the architecture. For example, the living room sofa frames echo the lines of the archways between rooms.All the draperies in the home are 100 percent cotton. The home came with much of the original hardware — and even some of the original light fixtures — intact. The sconces and iron curtain hardware in the living room are all original, as are all of the knobs and doors in the home. The interior doors were stripped of about 12 coats of paint to reveal the original wood, which was then stained and varnished in a high gloss.
Photos by John EllisHouzz at a GlanceWho lives here: A family that includes one daughter and a dogLocation: Hancock Park neighborhood of Los AngelesSize: 4,000 square feet (372 square meters)Designer: Rodrigo Vargas DesignWhen the homeowners approached Vargas, their one request was that the resulting decor be “easy,” not fussy. They wanted a beautiful home that wouldn’t require constant vigilance and care of overly precious items.In the living room, Vargas removed the heavy tasseled draperies to lighten the mood. As beautiful as lush textiles can be, the designer felt that creating an easy and comfortable interior for his clients meant honoring the Spanish architecture with lighter colors appropriate to the Southern California climate.
In the master bedroom, the nightstands, bed and dresser were all family pieces. Gates sought to modernize the traditional wood frames with modern bedding from Lulu DK for Matouk, crisp, tailored Roman shades, a striped rug and a modern photograph above the bed.
For the kitchen, Gates had the cabinets painted white and ripped out a mirror backsplash she recalls with a grimace, swapping it out for Waterworks subway tile and a Walker Zanger inset tile above the gray-green Viking range. Gates also replaced the old wood counters with honed black granite.
Gates reoriented the kitchen island and carved out a breakfast banquette next to the original fireplace, which the family uses for casual dinners. Breakfast chairs: Ballard Designs with custom cushions
In the den, Gates continued the darker theme that pervades the adjacent office but lightened up the walls with grasscloth. A leather Chesterfield sofa and navy velvet chairs give the room a rich, cozy feel, while the more modern throw pillows and Roman shades keep it from feeling too stiff.Paint: Farrow & Ball’s Down Pipe
You’ll notice that no room in this home has an identical color palette. To unify a whole house while giving each room its own distinctive mark, Gates suggests that “rooms should relate to one another, but in no way do they need to match.” Gates wanted to make the office feel dramatic, with pops of color added through the rug and the orange velvet chair. To keep it feeling like a jewel box, she had the ceiling papered in a star patterned wallpaper. The walls are covered in a high gloss Hague Blue from Farrow & Ball.
The centerpiece of the living room is the curved velvet sectional the homeowners purchased previously in New York City. “It fit the space beautifully,” Gates says. The designer wanted to carry some of the green from the dining room into this space, since they are open to each other. She commissioned draperies in a Peter Dunham green fabric and then upholstered the back of a classic wingback in his Fig Leaf fabric. Then, she mixed in some gold-framed metal and glass pieces “to keep things from getting too heavy and traditional.” The horse triptych from Natural Curiosities embodies Gates’ approach to helping her clients select art for a space: “Art is very personal,” she cautions, “but in general, I like to combine modern pieces with more traditional works. It’s one of my favorite looks.” The horse prints float cleanly and simply in modern black frames.Rug: Antique from Landry & Arcari; Upholstered chair: Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams
Gates cites the dining room as her favorite room in the house. The room came equipped with an elegant built-in glass cabinet, and the homeowners brought the table, chairs and painted green chest with them from New York, so the designer had great items to work with. From there, she added the rug, accessories and art. “The large abstract green painting was meant to inject some youthfulness and an unexpected edge to the otherwise traditional room,” Gates says. “We chose it based on the color, which plays nicely off the crystal sconces flanking it.” The wide plank floors were refinished in Minwax Provincial stain. The rug and window treatments were kept simple in sisal and sheer linen.
Photos by Michael J. LeeHouse at a GlanceWho lives here: A family of four Location: BostonSize: About 3,300 square feet (about 306.6 square meters)Designer: Erin Gates Design“The home was a huge project,” designer Erin Gates says about the historic five-level home she spruced up for a family of four in Boston’s charming Beacon Hill neighborhood. Built in 1875, the house had been renovated over the years but still needed quite a bit of work, including a new HVAC system, a kitchen and bath overhaul and floor refinishing. However, no walls came down or opened up: “We maintained the innate charm of the historical details,” Gates says. The overall vision for the project was to “respect the home’s patina and provenance while making it comfortable, beautiful and useful for a young family.” Re-introducing several key pieces from the couple’s former New York home gave many of the rooms a familiar comfort, which the designer deftly enhanced with transitional touches.
For Eberlein, properly dressing a window always starts by assessing the function required: In this south-facing bedroom, she tried to maximize light by using sheers under a beautiful green blackout-lined silk that matches the Sherwin-Williams Leapfrog covering the bookcases and built-ins. On top of that is a traditional valance in a Scalamandré brocatelle fabric. The company was about to discontinue the print, so Eberlein bought up a lot of yardage and used it throughout the room. The wall behind the bed is covered in a green silk wallpaper from Gracie. The beams are original to the building.Browse more homes by style: Apartments | Barn Homes | Colorful Homes | Contemporary Homes | Eclectic Homes | Farmhouses | Floating Homes | Guesthouses | Homes Around the World | Lofts | Midcentury Homes | Modern Homes | Ranch Homes | Small Homes | Townhouses | Traditional Homes | Transitional Homes | Vacation Homes
The master bedroom had only a tiny closet, so the designer pulled the wall in and added built-in closets. The ceiling is painted in Benjamin Moore’s Candle Light, a subdued pink that picks up on the lavender color in the Scalamandré fabric on the window seat and drapes. “It gives some character to the ceiling and reflects the tones in the room,” Eberlein says.
The counters and backsplash are made of quartzite. It’s slightly less hard than granite and doesn’t stain or scratch as much as marble. Toward the window, there’s a 4-inch ledge for the couple to keep oils and spices handy while cooking.
The kitchen, to a great extent, was the reason the couple bought the apartment. It’s “mammoth for New York,” Eberlein says. But the space was in need of a renovation. The kitchen was stripped of all original finishes. “The window was there, but that’s about it.” Just like in the living room, Eberlein added a plush window seat, building the banquette around the corner so the owners could sit and cozy up with cookbooks and plan menus as they often do. Undoubtedly, the centerpiece of the room is the gorgeous periwinkle La Canche range, which complements the white oak cabinetry. The floor is made of two different colored corks, a light color to go with the cabinetry with a dark inlay. The cork material is cost-effective, very soft underfoot, surprisingly durable and stain-resistant, Eberlein says.The clients collected the two colorful light fixtures in Italy years ago, and the fixture in the center of the room matches the one in the foyer.
The settee is not up all the way against the window wall because the couple loves to sit on the window seats and read. The clients already owned some nice Oriental rugs, so Eberlein took some color cues from them. But overall the home’s palette was about mixing things up. Eberlein suggests there’s “no reason to have things look the same. Part of the beauty of having multiple spaces is you can have multiple personalities. Exuberance is important,” she says.
All of the ornate plaster moldings in the home were fabricated by the specialists at Hyde Park Mouldings.Find traditional molding on Houzz
The living room has two points of entry coming off the foyer and the library, so the options for furniture arrangement was also constrained. The doorway to the library is set back enough to allow for an elaborate treatment around the limestone mantel. Eberlein had compound vertical pilasters added to emphasize the ceiling height, give the corner some rhythm and create the impression of thick, enveloping walls. Bordering the mantel are two wing chairs from Wood & Hogan that came with the couple from their old apartment. Their unusual shape helps them pass for antiques, but their real value is in their height: Both husband and wife are very tall and appreciate the generous back support of these cherished fireside chairs.
Since the room often doubles as a bedroom, Eberlein made sure to layer in Roman shades with blackout lining at the window. Coordinating the shades with the wallpaper makes the room open up a bit, while the window seat below connects the windows in a graceful way and makes them appear larger. For a cocktail table, instead of a big one that would take up a lot of floor space, they pulled in a ship captain’s chart chest from an antiques store in the Hamptons. Overhead light fixture: Vaughan
The homeowners love to entertain, so Eberlein transformed a former closet in the library into a stylish bar nook. It’s an “interesting exercise in how to capture space nobody thinks you have,” Eberlein says. The bar top flips down when it’s not needed, and what appears to be cabinetry actually hides the air handling system and mechanical equipment.
The library is a relatively small space at only 11 by 14 feet. “If you saw it unfurnished, you’d think ‘Gosh, you can’t fit much in here,’” Eberlein says. But with strategic thinking, she found a way. “The worst thing you can do is treat it timidly with under-scaled furniture. Small rooms really need a robust, gutsy approach.” Two of the corners were unusable because of the doors leading into the space, leaving one dominant wall where the sofa had to go. And the sofa is a big one, deep and comfy with room for six people, and with a single long cushion that can double as a bed when needed. On one side of the sofa is a multi-tiered table, but the other side could handle only a tiny table, so Eberlein hung paintings to counterbalance the asymmetry.
In the entry, Eberlein covered the ceiling with a subtle hammered gold wallpaper called Burnish Gilt from GP & J Baker. It’s a technique she employs often in rooms that lack natural light to bring in some needed reflectivity. This particular paper was chosen because it’s not too shiny, which was important in a room with relatively low ceilings where gold-leafing might have created an uncomfortable glare.Above the antique console table is one of many portraits of the family’s ancestors. “It’s hard for people with gorgeous paintings like that,” Eberlein says. “You want to use all of them, but if you overdo it, the effect can be a little backward-looking, too much about history and not enough about you.” Wallpaper: Gracie
Photos by Tom Crane Photography House at a GlanceWho lives here: A pair of lawyers who love to read, cook and entertainLocation: ManhattanSize: 1,400 square feet (130 square meters)Designer: Eberlein Design Consultants After working closely with them on their Long Island home, designer Barbara Eberlein knew her clients’ aesthetic well. “Both love early 20th-century buildings, and their tastes are very classical and traditional,” Eberlein says. That sense of classic design hits guests right when they walk through the front door.
At night the house glows like a lantern. Floating on its hilltop site, it incorporates active and passive solar design, incorporating photovoltaic panels and deep roof overhangs with the ventilating clerestory windows.More home tours: Apartments | Small Homes | Colorful Homes | Contemporary Homes | Eclectic Homes | Farmhouses | Midcentury Homes | Modern Homes | Ranch Homes | Traditional Homes | Transitional Homes | All
The master bathroom’s curbless walk-in shower includes a door that leads to an outdoor shower. Mahogany was used for the cabinets, which have black honed granite countertops.
The master bedroom windows frame a water view, with a pair of vintage Danish chairs positioned to take advantage of it. A pocket door to the right leads to a screened-in porch.
In the kitchen, the cabinetry and outer island countertop are mahogany. “It’s really appropriate for the house with its midcentury look, and it creates nice, clean lines,” DiRocco says. A pocket door on the right side of the kitchen leads to a pantry. Black honed granite countertops are featured near the gas range and on the interior island.
Large sliding glass doors connect the kitchen, dining and living areas to a large deck. The dining table and chairs are all vintage Danish midcentury.
To incorporate as many ocean-facing windows as possible, DiRocco and his team added columns to support the angled roofline, which peaks to about 18 feet. Two rows of clerestory windows on the ocean side add to the view and light.On the other side of the main living area, a built-in storage unit beneath clerestory windows hides media equipment. The light fixture above the dining table is from Louis Poulsen.
The height of the Douglas fir ceiling from the entry to the wall of windows bumps up about 4 feet in height, “so you enter in a compressed space and it opens up into an expansive living room,” DiRocco explains. The mahogany-framed windows are from Dynamic.The double-sided gas fireplace in the living area is white plaster, with a New York limestone base. A blackened metal insert separates the two materials. The fireplace features an open flame with no glass or other type of barrier.
Photos by Peter Vanderwarker House at a GlanceWho lives here: An academic couple who work at universities but also write from home Location: Truro, Massachusetts Size: 2,900 square feet (269.4 square meters)Designer: Don DiRocco and Mark Hammer of Hammer ArchitectsAt the end of a dirt road through the woods, an empty lot with Atlantic Ocean views provided the ideal spot for a couple to build their dream home. Avid collectors of vintage Danish furniture, these empty-nesters desired a new midcentury-inspired house to feature their furniture collection and take advantage of the views. Architect Don DiRocco says the design of the house “was informed by the views,” with all the public rooms and bedrooms featuring ocean vistas. The exterior of house is covered in red cedar.
Through the dining room’s French doors and down a step is perhaps the happiest space in the house, a charming little sun porch with arched windows. “I love this little room — it gets so much light,” Laura says. “If I have just one friend over for coffee, we’ll sit and visit out here.” Her kids also enjoy doing their homework on the sun porch. Doses of orange and pink enliven the room with color. The area rug keeps things light and covers original terra-cotta tiles that didn’t work with the color scheme.Wall paint: Snowfall White, Benjamin Moore
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