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Inspired by Childhood Farmhouse, Monterey Colonial House is all Americana

Sunday, July 5th, 2009

When she was a girl, Bebe Cassin and her younger brother would be sent on a train from California to Illinois, where they would spend summers on their grandparent’s farm. After a day riding the tractor and helping with the wheat harvest, she would return to the simple farmhouse and settle in with a good book, her grandmother’s quilts and the smell of pies baking in the oven.

It left a lasting impression.

“It made me love anything country,” she said.

Now, the house in Los Altos Hills she shares with her husband, B.J. Cassin, is in many ways an homage to rustic Americana. And it is has become the communal gathering place of their five children and seven grandchildren that – as Bebe likes to say – aren’t allowed to live outside a three-mile radius of the family home.

From early American pie safes to antique sideboards to folk art on the walls, Bebe has spent a lifetime finding pieces she loves.

“Luckily, B.J. went along with my collecting,” she said of her husband of 48 years, a venture capitalist and philanthropist. “I’m glad he doesn’t like modern – it would never have worked out.”

While the house is not farmhouse in style like her grandparents’, it is a classic white Monterey Colonial, providing a fresh backdrop to her favorite reds, whites and blues. And the couple have graciously opened it to numerous fund-raisers, most recently to benefit the Los Altos History Museum.

A curving country road takes visitors up to the three-acre, manicured estate, dripping with oaks and hydrangeas. On first approach, the three-story rear of the house, bedecked with windows, reveals itself. Down below, a vineyard is ripening fruit, readying for its first year of production for the couple’s “Red Setter” label named after their favorite breed of dogs.

Winding around to the front of the house, past the caretaker’s cottage, swimming pool and tennis court, a whitewashed gate beckons visitors into the front courtyard. Wicker settees with fluffy Nantucket blue pillows and a Jasper Johns-style American flag painting hanging under the eaves welcome you in.

The couple purchased the property in 1990, when only their last child remained at home. They remodeled the kitchen and opened up the servants’ quarters into a large, vaulted-ceiling family room. In the loft above, Bebe keeps her collection of antique dolls, quilts and pull toys that are at the ready for her grandchildren to play with. In the house hang two folk paintings by Charles Wysocki. Bebe also acquired an old wagon that reminds her of her grandfather’s wagon on the farm and turned it into a coffee table in the sun room.

While the pool and tennis court used to be down below where the vineyard is now, they rebuilt the pool and tennis court on higher ground across from the front courtyard to take advantage of the sunshine. Downstairs, in what used to be the dressing rooms for the pool, the Cassins converted the space to a wine cellar with an antique round chopping block for tastings, and a playroom with a billiards table that is kid-central during the couple’s annual Christmas party.

Bebe keeps some of her favorite pieces closest to her. An antique secretary and a Lincoln rocker that belonged to her great grandparents ornament the master bedroom and her great-grandmother’s lavender quilt is nearby in the loft.

They remind her of her childhood in Illinois. And whenever she thinks of those days, “I just love that whole feeling.”

Update:

This post is featured in the San Jose Mercury News Home and Garden section here.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Art, Bedroom, Decorating, Dining Room, Family Room, Featured, Games, Garden, Historic, Home and Garden, Home Decor, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Interior Design, Julia, Kitchen, Landscape | 2 Comments »

Backyard Landscaping Gives Bungalow Home Style and Function

Saturday, June 27th, 2009

When Rick Partridge and Jack Black purchased the 1916 Arts and Crafts Bungalow in San Jose’s Hanchett Park in 2005, they finally found a home for the period Stickley furniture they had been collecting for more than two decades.

But the backyard was another story. An awkward triangular deck off the back bedroom was a safety hazard with steep stairs and an overgrown hedge along the driveway split the small backyard in two. The homeowners were big entertainers and wanted a space that worked for parties of 100, as well as an intimate space for two to lounge around the hot tub.

“Jack and I both grew up in the south, where you turn the AC on from March ’til October,” Rick said. Now that California was their home, they wanted to take advantage of outdoor living. (And they also wanted a place for their hammock.)

The solution? Bring in a friend and neighbor, architectural designer Steve Hinderberger of Hindesign. The first order of business was to rip out the hedges.

“That was the most dramatic,” Hinderberger said. “It opened up the space and you could see the potential.”

They decided to keep all the trees, especially the Chinese Pistache in the middle of the yard.

“It became a centerpoint and things radiate out around it,” he said. And that meant designing a series of outdoor rooms, from formal to casual.

He started by replacing the old deck at the back of the house with a new, larger one made of dense Ipe wood, and gave a sense of enclosure with brick planters. A few steps down is the semi-circular dining patio. Hinderberger unearthed some of the original stones that had sunken and re-used them for the patio.

Pavers were used along the driveway to make it feel more like a patio than a driveway, and a built-in barbecue was installed near the back kitchen door. (Another neighbor, interior designer Madeleine Randal, transformed the inside white kitchen from what Partridge called an “operating room” into an updated space with grey soapstone counters and seaform blue backsplashes.)

The focal point of the backyard is the arbor at the back corner of the yard surrounded by soft landscaping. During the Hanchett Park Home Tour in late May, Partridge and Black hung a bright red swing from the arbor (their answer to the hammock.) But the arbor also serves as a frame for an ever-changing feature.

“Even in the plans, we put ‘sculptural element here,’” Hinderberger said. “It becomes almost a stage to highlight something of interest. They change it at least once every year, so it’s kind of fun to see what’s going to be there.” Partridge and Black have swapped out a fountain, a sculpture and a large planted urn under the arbor over the years.

“It’s kind of fun when you have a design concept, but what becomes really great is when the client embraces that and lives that,” Hinderberger said. “We were very in sync.”

Perhaps the most meaningful focal point of all came when Partridge and Black exchanged wedding vows in a ceremony surrounded by friends. Under the arbor were framed the groom and groom.

Hinderberger, of San Jose, can be reached at stevehinderberger@att.net.

(Photos by Desiree Northend)

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Before and After, Bungalow, Garden, Historic, Home and Garden, House Tours, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Julia, Kitchen, Landscape, San Jose, Yard | 2 Comments »

Tiny Craftsman Bungalow Stays Tiny After Big Makeover

Wednesday, June 17th, 2009

The 1920s Craftsman bungalow was 1,450 square feet when the family of three moved into the house. And after a significant remodel and another baby, it hasn’t grown a square foot. But with creativity and style, it works beautifully for this young family.

The biggest change Jamey Graham and his wife Sharon Kojima made was converting a family room and laundry room that spanned the back of the house into a master bedroom on one side and a master bathroom and closet on the other. With a central hallway dividing the two spaces, plus a glass door leading to the back yard at the end, visitors walking in the front door can see clear through to the back yard. For a small house, the light at the end of the tunnel goes miles in making the bungalow feel larger.

The only problem? “We violated Feng Shui” principles by being able to see through the house, Jamey said. But the couple installed a door to close off the master suite from the rest of the house — and keep the good spirits inside.

They installed hardwood floors into the two children’s rooms in the bedroom wing, and in the main living area, they tore down a wall that separated the kitchen from the dining and living rooms. Walk in, and you feel one big open, inviting, living, dining and kitchen space, plus a peek to the back yard. All were put together with quality and care by “Paradise Art and Garden” on Park Avenue in San Jose and J.P. Novotny Construction.

The San Jose house was the smallest on the Hanchett Park Home tour in late May. But it made a big impact.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Bungalow, Craftsman, Dining Room, Eichler, Featured, Garden, Historic, Home and Garden, Home Decor, House Tours, Julia, Kitchen, Landscape, Lighting, Peek of the Week, Remodel | 3 Comments »

Home Design Ideas: Front Porch, River Rock Sells this Craftsman Home

Wednesday, June 10th, 2009

Suzanne Garcia and her husband, Rob Brackett, had spent many an evening wandering through the Hanchett Park neighborhood, taking snapshots of the old Arts and Crafts homes with broad front porches and side-gables.

They were ready to buy, but none of their favorites were ever for sale. So they decided to do the next-best thing and build their own Craftsman home a neighborhood over, using their photos for inspiration. They had reached the permit stage when their realtors told them about a vintage Craftsman for sale in San Jose’s Hanchett Park.

“They had told us it’s one of the houses in the neighborhood that has river rock,” Suzanne said. “When we drove up, we were — ‘oh gosh, I have a picture of this house in my binder!’ Who can believe it, right?”

Once inside, they were thrilled to see that none of the impressive woodwork from the 1916 home had been painted.

“Now that I’ve lived in it for a while, you get used to it, but people just stop and say ‘Wow, wow, you just don’t see woodwork like that!’”

The floor plan was mostly original and the biggest changes were to areas they planned to update anyway — the kitchen and bathrooms. And after their purchase in 2007, a careful renovation began.

“We wanted a real master bath with the luxuries of today, but with that vintage quality. So we did handmade subway tile from Fireclay,” in San Jose, she said. “We found some accent tile in recycled green glass.”

Inspired by her collection of Bauer pottery, the couple painted the downstairs rooms in rich colors.

While they added a clawfoot tub in one bathroom, they added a luxurious steam shower and jacuzzi tub in the master bath.

“Some people will say we should have been more authentic,” she said, “Others will say what a great way to blend the old with the new.”

People who got a glimpse of the home during the Hanchett Park home tour in late May got to make up their own minds. And it’s hard to imagine anyone would disagree that the house is a lovely blend indeed.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Bedroom, Bungalow, Craftsman, Decorating, Dining Room, Historic, Home Decor, House Tours, Julia, Kitchen, Peek of the Week, Remodel, San Jose | 1 Comment »

California Craftsman, Italian Revival, Bungalows on Hanchett Home Tour

Friday, May 22nd, 2009

Realtors are well-known for “expanding” the boundaries of popular neighborhoods like San Jose’s Willow Glen and Rose Garden. But the residents of the distinctive Hanchett Park neighborhood, a largely unknown enclave of period California Craftsmen, Italian Revivals and Prairie-style homes, are tired, quite frankly, of being referred to as “the lower Rose Garden.”

Hanchett Park’s graceful streetscape design, including European-like traffic roundabouts and original entrance pillars, was designed in 1907 by John McLaren who designed Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. The neighborhood is often referred to in a larger sense as the Shasta Hanchett neighborhood because Shasta Avenue is the main street that runs through it. But the historic name is Hanchett Residence Park and it is nestled between The Alameda and Park Avenue. Several of the Arts and Crafts homes in the neighborhood were once featured in American Bungalow Magazine.

Now, a grass roots group, calling itself the Hanchett Park Heritage Project, hopes to rebuild the historic gateway pillars with pergolas at key entrance points around the neighborhood, including Martin Avenue at The Alameda. They’re hosting their first home tour, featuring five historic houses, on May 30 to raise money for the project.

“Hanchett Park is one of only two residential parks in San Jose. The other is Palm Haven and no one has ever heard of us,” said Hillary Savage, a neighborhood resident who is helping plan the home tour. Residential parks were some of the first “subdivisions” at the turn of the last century that were planned with utility poles running at the back of the lots, decorative lighting and landscaping to “retain a park-like atmosphere.”

One of the most enthusiastic supporters of the project and the neighborhood is Larry Camuso, who has restored his 1926 Italian Revival home into a stunning showplace and earned it a city historical designation. The house, which was originally built as a one-story home in 1908 then radically remodeled in 1926 with a second-story and Palladian windows, echoes the Hollywood glamour and style of its day.

And Camuso, with his partner Kirk Wentland, is getting it ready for the tour. Camuso, 49, is long a fan of the classic “Sunset Boulevard,” where the Hollywood mansion is a much a character as stars Gloria Swanson and William Holden.

“I discovered that movie in my 20s and thought that was what I was all about,” Camuso said. “That whole period of time, the style, design, art and decoration, it created a vision for me.” In fact, the look of the upstairs master suite, including the custom-made water spout in the bathroom, came right out of an Art Deco movie set book. Interior designer Paul Rokovich brought the vision to reality throughout the house.

“I’m stuck in the 1920s living in this house,” said Camuso, who is semi-retired from his antique and collector car parts business. (The house was built with a detached three-car garage, including a repair “pit” in one of the bays. “Sold!”)

Like many homeowners in the neighborhood, Camuso embarked on a historically-correct renovation. Though the house was in good condition when he bought it in 1991, he began five years later to restore its original footprint and fixtures. And he marshaled the memories of one of its original inhabitants, Lucretia Martin Schlueter, who was raised there until 1954.

“By way of old pictures that Lucretia supplied, I was able to put it back the way it was,” he said. Camuso threw an 80th birthday party for the house in 2006, and invited Lucretia, who is in her 90s and lives in Carmel, as the guest of honor.

“The house had great bones, but was never fully realized as far as its aesthetic values.” He removed a bathroom and closet off the main entry hall and returned the space to its original purpose — a rear hallway that separates the living room from the study. He also replaced the replacement windows — in other words, any flat glass that had been installed to fix broken windows over the years was replaced with vintage wavy glass that Camuso tracked down at Anderson C&M Used Building Material on Montgomery Street near downtown San Jose. He had nearly every one reglazed.

“It’s like a shimmering show of wavy glass,” he said.

Along with Camuso’s home, several turn-of-the-century Craftsman bungalows will be on the tour, including one with original stone columns in front. Also on the tour is one of the first homes built in the subdivision, considered the model home of its day. The large, shingled house was designed by the well-known Wilson-McKenzie architecture firm, which designed many homes in Naglee Park near downtown.

Outside the downtown core of Victorians, “this was considered modern, in terms of 1908,” Savage said.

Preparation for the home tour has been a neighborhood preoccupation over the past two years, as several homeowners have hosted cocktail and garden parties to raise money among themselves for the event.

The city of San Jose’s Redevelopment Agency is helping with funding to build the first set of pillars at The Alameda and Martin that were removed in the 1960s, probably because of disrepair. But residents want to rebuild the pillars at other key entry points as well, including at Park and Tillman avenues, with an estimated cost of $40,000 each.

“We have to have a lot of home tours,” Savage said.

Tickets for the Saturday, May 30th tour, may be purchased for $25 the day of the tour at 1265 Sierra Avenue, or $21 in advance through hanchettpark.org.

(Story by Julia Prodis Sulek. Photos by Desiree Northend.)

Update:

This post is featured in the San Jose Mercury News Home and Garden section here.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Art, Bedroom, Bungalow, Craftsman, Decorating, Featured in the San Jose Mercury News, Historic, Home and Garden, Home Decor, House Tours, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Interior Design, Julia, Remodel, San Jose | 3 Comments »

Spanish Style Bungalow Home For Willow Glen Woman

Friday, May 8th, 2009

Stacie Puma was renting in Los Gatos when she took a drive with her boyfriend down a shady street lined with charming old cottages. “What neighborhood is this?” she asked him. “It’s gorgeous.”

Ten years later, she’s living on that very street, in a Spanish bungalow she has made her own with French and Tuscan touches. And just as she loved walking to the charming downtown streets of Los Gatos, she can now walk to Willow Glen’s Lincoln Avenue. She opened her house for the 2009 Willow Glen Home tour in early May.

Stacie always loved old houses, and this one still maintained its vintage charm. Built in 1926, this 1,600 square-foot home still has its original yellow tile in the kitchen and bath. The windows and living room mantel are also original details she loves. When she needed extra room for the refrigerator in the kitchen, a little wall was knocked out, revealing a brick chimney coming up from the basement. She asked the crew to keep the brick exposed. It adds a rustic feel, next to a vintage Wedgewood stove she purchased from a San Francisco couple.

“It’s almost like French Provincial meets Tuscany kind of feel,” she said. “I added a lot of iron to have some masculinity to offset the feminine look.”

She added rich colors of reds, golds and olives to complete the look inside.

Outside, with the help of her neighbor, Matt Guarascio of “The Scape Artist,” she added fountains and pathways. They preserved the old fireplace at the rear of the yard for evening gatherings.

“My backyard is my sanctuary,” she said, adding that she opened her master bedroom to the yard with French doors.

Stacie also designed an iron gate, which was fabricated by Garcia’s Ornamental Iron Works. For the tour, flowers were beautifully arranged by Flowers by Pat Conroy.

Stacie knows that after all these years, she has found home.

“I have met the most amazing people in this neighborhood,” she said. “It’s a whole new family for me.”

You might also enjoy these stories:

A Decorator’s Daughter Loves Small House Style
Gentle Remodel on Spanish Bungalow
Colonial Revival Home Renovation – Whitney Wright Mansion
Before and After – Rustic Kitchen Remodel
Small House Remodel Maintains Charm
Downsizing and Restyling: From French Country to Modern Neutral
Renovating and Decorating to Inspire Home and Business
Mid-Century Modern from California Ranch: A Town and Country Life

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Bathroom, Bedroom, Bungalow, Decorating, Dining Room, Garden, Historic, Home and Garden, House Tours, Interior Design, Julia, Kitchen, Landscape, Peek of the Week, San Jose, Willow Glen, Yard | 3 Comments »

Big Sur’s Nepenthe Turns 60, But a Log Cabin is Still Home

Saturday, April 25th, 2009

For 60 years at Big Sur’s famed Nepenthe restaurant, cameras have been clicking away on the obvious – the cliffside view of the dramatic Pacific coastline, the iconic, mid-century restaurant of glass and wood, the grand terrace where Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton filmed the 1965 classic, “The Sandpiper.”

But just above the terrace is a humble, but intriguing dwelling hiding in plain sight from guests awed by the captivating view.

Behind a brick facade is a structure of logs and adobe cement that Hollywood legend Orson Welles and his wife Rita Hayworth bought on a romantic whim in 1944.

This weekend, as Nepenthe celebrates the 60th anniversary of the restaurant’s opening, we turn our lens toward this tiny and surprisingly vibrant place that is still home to members of the same fascinating family that founded Nepenthe and run it today.

The Bohemian aura of Nepenthe, the beatniks, the belly dancing, the poetry, the parties began in this cabin. In those days, the cabin was the first stop for guests.

“The log cabin was the hub of everything that went on,” says Romney “Nani” Steele, who grew up in the cabin with her grandparents and cousins in the 1960s. “The restaurant was built in such a way, it was somewhat added to the cabin,’’ she says. “My grandmother created a whole life behind the restaurant.”

Her grandparents, Bill and Lolly Fassett, moved into the three-room cabin in 1947 with their five children and within two years had built Nepenthe, naming it for the Greek word meaning “no sorrow.”

The cabin and 12 acres had cost them $12,000 after Welles and Hayworth divorced and sold them the property. The Hollywood couple had planned the 1925 cabin as a getaway when they purchased it from a hiking group. The stars even measured for curtains, but never returned.

Renting the cabin at the time was author Henry Miller, who had already written the scandalous “Tropic of Cancer.” He moved out when the Fassetts bought the cabin, but became lifelong friends with Bill Fassett, a gregarious storyteller who ran a magazine in Carmel. Lolly Fassett was a cultured, artistic woman in her own right, having lived her teen years in Europe as the traveling companion of her grandmother, artist Jane Gallatin Powers, who was part of the original Carmel art scene.

The Fassetts were great entertainers and envisioned Nepenthe even though Highway One had been open only a decade and traffic through the area was light. Lolly, influenced by the great piazzas of Capri, insisted that architect Rowan Maiden – a disciple of Frank Lloyd Wright – design a great terrace for dancing and a restaurant that opened to the air. It was Lolly who made the adobe bricks and laid them for the giant round fireplace on the terrace. When Nepenthe opened April 24, 1949, about 500 people attended the grand opening. Photographs were shot for architectural magazines.

The guests had traveled 30 miles of winding road from Carmel and beyond. Life in Big Sur, then, as now, was dictated by the ebb and flow of nature. In the winters, the roads washed out and in summers, wildfires whipped through.

“It created tension and upheaval and a dynamic quality of people,” says Kirk Gafill, a Fassett grandson, who grew up in the cabin and runs Nepenthe with his mother, Holly Fassett.

From artists to hippies, his grandmother welcomed them into her living room.

“When we were growing up, nightly 10, 15, 20 people were in the living room visiting with her,” says Steele, whose book “My Nepenthe” will be published this fall (www.mynepenthebook.com). “People came in and napped there.” Some of those wayfarers fell in love with the Fassett daughters, married them, had children, then continued on their journeys. Four of those children spent part of their childhood living in the cabin.

“Our absolutely favorite thing to do was to lie on my grandmother’s long row of beds and look out the window with our hands perched under our chins,” says Steele, 43. “People would get up and dance. Someone would be in the corner reading poetry or playing music. I can remember the sun coming through the window and watching for hours what was going on.”

Every once in a while, her grandmother would say, “Go dance!” “She would wrap scarves around my waist and we’d whirl around,” Steele says. “We’d do that for guests and we would come back up the stairs. She always had plenty of costumes, petticoats, Flamenco costumes, just amazing stuff.”

Erin Gafill, 45, Steele’s cousin who is an artist, says that “the line between fantasy and reality was totally blurred. There was so much magic and glamour around here.” She has a foggy memory of lying on her back as a toddler on the terrace, looking up at the sky between the branches of the old oak tree.

“This man appeared and scooped me up. I couldn’t stop crying,” Gafill recalls. “Years later my mom told me this was Richard Burton, and that Liz Taylor took me from his arms and handed me to my mom, who was sitting on the bleachers in shock at the whole thing.”

It was 1964 and the movie stars were filming “The Sandpiper” on the terrace. Its theme song, “The Shadow of Your Smile” became a classic. When the movie about an artist’s illicit affair with a schoolmaster premiered in 1965, Nepenthe was transformed. The Fassetts opened Nepenthe from seasonally to year-round.

After Lolly died in 1986, Gafill returned to the cabin, raised two children, and still lives there her husband.

“It seemed like an impossible place to live,” she says, recalling her decision to make the move. The cabin “was so psychologically important to us. I had to make sure the change was OK with everybody.”

She’s done her best to preserve the spirit of the cabin. It still has three main rooms, including the kitchen and big stone fireplace. An extra bedroom was added along the way. Behind the door of the log cabin’s kitchen is the industrial prep kitchen for the restaurant. When the adobe cement began to chip away on the side of the cabin facing the terrace, a brick facade was overlaid to protect it from the wind and fog. Inside, she covered the cabin’s redwood walls with her great-great grandmother’s paintings. Family and restaurant crew took them to safety when the wildfires came dangerously close to Nepenthe last summer, closing the restaurant for three weeks.

As the extended family gathers this weekend for the anniversary, the cabin will beckon them in. And as they planned all along, there will be dancing on the terrace.

(Top black and white photograph of Nepenthe taken in1950 by Morley Baer, ©2009 by the Morley Baer Photography Trust, Santa Fe; Lee Harbick Collection, California History Room, Monterey Public Library. Color photo in cabin with Erin Gafill on right and her mother, Holly, by Tom Birmingham.)

Update:

This post is featured in the San Jose Mercury News Home and Garden section here.

Update 2:

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Carmel, Featured in the San Jose Mercury News, Historic, Home and Garden, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Julia, Kitchen, Modern, Painting | 4 Comments »

Restored Italianate Victorian Home Revives Neighborhood

Saturday, February 28th, 2009

When Manuel Lima was a teen-ager in the 1960s and worked at a motel on Beach Hill in Santa Cruz, he admired an old Italianate Victorian house next door so much that he sketched it — white ink on black paper. So when he came to work one day and found the Victorian had been demolished, he was devastated. That powerful emotion led to a lifelong passion when he bought his own Italianate Victorian home in 1973 in downtown San Jose. And as he worked to restore his own Victorian, he saved the rest of his neighborhood as well. “A house doesn’t make it without a neighborhood,” he said. “I wasn’t going to move the house, so I had to make the neighborhood better.”

Along with Lenore Porcella and a core group of other neighbors, Lima helped establish the Hensley Historic District. So instead of a sea of high-density housing that would have razed 200 historic homes, much of the neighborhood is still old Victorians being restored one-by-one.

“The neighborhood still has an edge to it,” Lima said,”but it’s coming along.”

When he first bought the house, though, “everyone I knew said, ‘what are you doing?’”

The house was situated between a rescue mission, the Salvation Army and railroad tracks. Broken bottles and trash littered the streets and railroad tracks. The 1879 house was old and dirty, but had maintained most of its character. And so Lima set out on a never-ending quest to bring the Victorian back to its former glory — and he’s essentially done it all himself, including putting on a new roof.

“I wanted something that I could not finish,” said Lima, 63. “I painted the outside of this four times myself. I’ve done most of the rooms at least twice.”

He knew it was wonderful when he bought it, “but I didn’t know how wonderful” until he worked on it and uncovered some of its secrets, including the tongue and groove walls in the kitchen hidden behind a 1950s remodel.

“No one did anything that wasn’t reversible,” he said. He was able to restore an old gas lamp in the kitchen.

One of the most dramatic features of the home is the wallpaper _ from Bradbury & Bradbury Art Wallpapers’ famed studio in Benicia. The company reproduces historic wallpaper designs from Victorians through Arts and Crafts, Deco and Modern. And owner Bruce Bradbury, anxious to have a show-house in the south bay, gave it to Lima at cost, Lima said. And, of course, Lima installed it himself.

“I would wallpaper from 1 a.m. to 6 a.m. when no one could distract me,” said Lima, a landscaper by trade. “I needed to be left alone so I could do it as correctly as possible.”

It’s one of the first features you notice when you enter the home, from the entry hall and the “Turkish corner” with a lantern and fainting couch under the stairway, to the formal parlour and dining room. Delicate fields of color and pattern are interrupted by giant medallion flowers. Lima’s crocheted white window panels handmade by his mother and grandmother are graceful counterpoints to the paper.

This year marks the 36th anniversary of his ownership of the house, and there’s still more work to do.

“People marry other people,” Lima said. “This house is my wife.”

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Decorating, Dining Room, Historic, Home and Garden, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Interior Design, Julia, Kitchen, San Jose, Victorian | 10 Comments »

Los Gatos Estate – La Estancia – A Mission Revival Kept Lively by David and Larry

Friday, December 19th, 2008

From the sloping road just blocks from downtown Los Gatos, it’s easy to miss the grand estate called La Estancia. Condos are above and condos are below. And even if you know which gates the house hides behind, you’d still be lucky to catch a glimpse of the servants’ entrance.

But on a summer night, you can hear the place. The music rises up from the loggia. There’s chatter and laughter and dancing. And on some nights, David Stonesifer — in his signature round-rimmed glasses — sits at the baby grand piano and plays.

The home of Stonesifer and Larry Arzie — former owners of the Los Gatos Porch interior design store — has been a storied estate for more than 100 years. And in the hands of Arzie and Stonesifer for the past 27 years, it’s become a community gem whose gates have been opened for countless nonprofit fundraisers from the San Jose Symphony to the Los Gatos Police Auxiliary. Parties and weddings for their friends have become legendary.

“The place represents a collective tribute to good taste,” said Peter Carter, a former advertising executive and photographer who had his wedding reception for 800 guests at La Estancia nearly 20 years ago. “It’s a real treasure.”

The house was originally built by Frank McCullough in the 1880s as a Victorian on a 200-acre prune orchard. The main entrance at the base of the sloping hillside was marked by substantial stone columns facing Pennsylvania Street. But when the McCulloughs sold the property, the new owners sold off all but 60 acres. When the McCulloughs repurchased what was left of it some years later at the turn-of-the-century, they hired Willis Polk — the famed architect who would one day design the Filoli estate in Woodside — to transform it.

Mrs. McCullough adored the California missions and asked Polk to revive the style on her property. The story goes that Polk wanted to tear down the Victorian and start over, but the McCulloughs wouldn’t allow it. Instead, the house with two pitched roofs was pulled apart by mule, a loggia and living room were built to straddle the two sections, and a stucco and tile exterior refaced the entire building. The remodel was complete in June 1905 — and was considered one of the first Mission Revival homes in California, Arzie said. It is on the National Historic Registry.

Dr. Horace Jones bought the property in 1939 and brought the building up to date. But with new owners in the 1960s and ’70s, more land above and below was sold for condo developments. The house fell into disrepair. It was scheduled for demolition in the 1970s, but local preservationists stopped that effort.

It had been on the market for about two years when Arzie and Stonesifer decided to buy it in 1981. The two had met in the art department while students at San Jose State in 1962, and went on to establish one of the most successful interior design businesses in Los Gatos. They ran Los Gatos Porch for 32 years until they sold it in 2002. Stonesifer still works as an interior designer and painter.

He remembers when he first saw the house “sitting back at the end of a dirt patch.” It was covered in ivy with plaster missing.

“Take me through the house before it falls down or burns down,” Stonesifer told his realtor. And after insisting they also be allowed to purchase an adjoining acre scheduled for condo development, Arzie and Stonesifer became the new owners and began a grand renovation of house and grounds.

Arzie, who grew up in Hollister “with a hammer in one hand and a shotgun in the other,” hopped on a tractor and began terracing and re-landscaping the property. He built a pond and fountain and new terrace out front, and vegetable gardens. Blood oranges were planted around the pool. A trellis graced the front of the guest house.

Inside, they uncovered secrets of the old Victorian, including a hidden fireplace in a guest bedroom. As sought-after decorators in Los Gatos, they filled their home with antiques from their shop and their travels.

“Most decorators’ homes don’t look like what they decorate,” Arzie said. “They just assemble instead of thinking it out. It’s a montage of things that happens in your life.”

At La Estancia, it’s a collection that evokes Old World splendor in a setting that harkens back to an era of grace and beauty, where the host plays the piano for entertainment and if he’s lucky, some of his guests will get up and sing.

And in this cherished, lively house, they often do.

Update:

This post is featured in the San Jose Mercury News Home and Garden section here.

Here’s the complete slideshow:

Posted in Architecture, Decorating, Historic, Home and Garden, Home Decor, Inside Stories, Inside Story, Julia, Landscape | No Comments »

Craftsman Remodel Decked Out For Christmas

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

Judy and Tedd Wallace had been asked to put their Craftsman home a few blocks from downtown Los Gatos on the Summit League home tour for 20 — make that 25 — years. And each year she said no. As an interior decorator herself who had owned Cottonwoods fabrics and accessories in Los Gatos for two decades, Judy knew that it would be tremendous work to get it ready. And handing over her century-old Craftsman to a dozen other decorators to transform it for the holidays wouldn’t be easy, either.

But one of her dearest friends, Jan Willoughby, was president of the Summit League this year that raises money for charity. And with her husband game for the challenge, she agreed. Plus, truth be told, she thought her house was ready for a little updating, and the tour would be the perfect excuse. And the results? Fabulous. Moments before hundreds of people walked through the stately old place last weekend — and with decorators still primping the details — Lookiloos (with notebook and camera in hands) got an advance peek of perfection.

Not that all of the preparations went smoothly, mind you. There were some differences of opinion, shall we say, over recovering certain pieces of furniture. And some of the furnishings she hoped would remain in the house were unceremoniously relegated to the carport for the duration.

Decorated or not, the home itself was a gem to see. Built in the early 1900s, and considered one of the finest examples of Craftsman architecture in Los Gatos, guests are welcomed by a graceful front porch. Leaded glass door bookcases, half timbering in the living room and substantial moldings adorn the home. The Wallaces undertook a major remodel in 1987, adding a master suite and office upstairs, and an extended dining room, remodeled kitchen and new family room downstairs.

Judy considers her style eclectic, and her furnishings range from the antique to contemporary. And the dozen decorators added their artistic touches, both big and small, to the house. Evergreen garlands were wound around the four-poster master bed. Wreaths were hung in the dining room windows, each dangling a china plate as a centerpiece. Modern lamps were flanked on either side of the old fireplace.

“We loved the creative energy running through the house,” she said of her partnership with the decorators. “That’s what I miss most from not running my store anymore.”

In the end, Judy said, “it turned out beautifully.”

But still, she enjoyed making her own statement. With an antique table that had been sent to the carport, a mirror moved out of an upstairs bedroom, some candlesticks, an angel and uprooted succulents, she pulled together her own little vignette outside the back door. And she was happy to hear that for some people, it was their favorite.

(come back to www.lookiloos.com in the next two weeks to see the other Summit League Homes.)

Decorators for the Wallace House on the Summit League House Tour

Front Yard and Porch — Jason Bowman, California Horticulture Landscape Construction, Inc. Campbell, CA.

Entry, Front Hall and Staircase — Sharon Watts, Peony

Living Room — David Stonesifer Interior Design & Decoration, Los Gatos

Powder Room — Julie Black, Cassandra Dotzler

Master Bedroom — Claudia Mann, Debbie Walker, Rebecca Cabral, Vivie Desigaux, The Maids’ Quarters Inc, Los Gatos (story here)

Green Bedroom — Bev Viguerie, Viguerie Interiors, Capitola; Erin Crain, H Interiors, San Jose

Blue Bedroom — Gail Madison Goodhue, Madison Interiors, Santa Cruz

Dining Room — Fredrick Ojeda, Craig Shannon, Acanthus Interior Design, Los Gatos

Kitchen and Family Room — Joella Canover, Patricia Enos, Jessica Nakamoto, Interiors & Antiques, Los Gatos

Lanai — Lance Lew, NBC Channel 11, Petaluma