A quick overview. For close-ups and greater detail, SEE Blog.
A quick overview. For close-ups and greater detail, SEE Blog.
A quick overview. For close-ups and greater detail, SEE Blog.
A quick overview. For close-ups and greater detail, SEE Blog.
A quick overview. For close-ups and greater detail, SEE Blog.
clients
Bath & Powder
Design Is A Passion
“A house plan should wrap a timeless design of function and beauty around the lives it embraces.”
— Sally Anderson
I first gained a love of architectural and interior design back in childhood.
As early as I can remember, my mother often took me on open-house tours. She’d walk me through the new homes and educate me (she and my father were teachers) about what was working in the home designs, what wasn’t and why. She tutored me on both functional layout as well as interior detailing.
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My mom’s father was a cement contractor in the Los Angeles area who did everything from exterior stucco, Spanish tile roofing, and stone and tile installation.
He built the family residence, a Spanish Colonial completed in 1929 and kept in the family for over 25 years. He even did his own interior design.
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Seeing his level of craftsmanship made a strong impression on me at a very early age. Both my mother and grandfather invested in me a rich storehouse of insights and a passion for excellence I treasure to this day.
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Having worked in construction and design for the past 20 years, I’ve enjoyed tremendous artistic fulfillment. But more than that, I’ve been honored to help clients develop their own visions for their homes. That vision often starts with a simple concept or a sketch, an emotion expressed or several photos that capture the DNA of what the home should ultimately become.
Design is a Process
…From Concept to Completion
One of my clients came to me with the assignment of drawing the plans for her 8,000 square foot house that would be built in a country club development. Their enviable plot of land was perched on a small rise overlooking the golf course with the tee for Hole One just thirty yards from where they wanted their front door to be.
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She had a very specific look in mind: she wanted their home styled after a 1930s vintage Spanish colonial, but she didn’t know how to express it. Although she didn’t sketch her thoughts on a napkin (a wonderful canvas for innovation), she did have a four-second clip from a Disney movie, The Parent Trap. The scene occurred when one twin daughter was meeting her father for the first time. Looking out the car window through quickly passing trees, she saw her father’s California vineyard estate, a house that epitomized what my client was looking for.
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My husband found the best freeze-frame from which to make a photographic enlargement. From there, we began designing, and this is the final house we built.
It’s a privilege to nurture a person’s ideas (however simple or incomplete) and co-develop them side-by-side with my client into a finished project. Throughout the process I engineer and problem-solve, aided by the wisdom of trusted tradesmen, to make the client’s vision a smashing success.
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Oddly enough, I’ve learned that clients often need a sense of freedom (even permission) to be creative about their own home’s design, whether it’s interior or architectural aspects. Cable TV programs and social media bombard the public with what’s in style, what’s acceptable, what’s beautiful and what’s trendy. As much as that information can be useful, it’s often overwhelming and intimidating.
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One famous owner/founder of a mega-brand design company boldly admitted in an interview recently: “We don’t ask the public what they want, we tell them.” How gutsy! The inference is: ‘we need the public to want what we sell; therefore we’ll convince them that our “look” or products are what they want.’
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That mentality is rampant throughout the home design industry as much as it is in clothing fashion. As a result, over time customers get the impression that only the experts really know what’s best for them and that their own ideas for their homes aren’t trustworthy or valid.
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The housing development industry also reinforces this position. Home builders ask the public to fit their highly unique lives into a “custom” generic house that can typically be produced quickly en masse for the best profit margin. As these homes are built, corners are often cut, and buyers are forbidden to ask for any custom features during construction, even if those changes don’t cost much more. Any deviation from the assembly line will automatically catapult the tract home into the dreaded category of a true custom home which, as any spec builder will tell you, always costs a bazillion dollars more…just because.
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As a result, generic homes driven by cookie-cutter trends become the low-bar average of what people learn to accept — even at the million+ dollar price point.
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And yet, there is always the possibility of excellence well-planned!
