Mid Century House
Embracing an understated Palm Springs vibe, we applied a contemporary new vision to this Mid-Century stunner. Low and slow was the order of the day, nuanced with just enough luxe, colour and fun.
What was the brief?
This is the second house we’ve designed for this client and there’s a great little story about how it came to be.
Ever curious to discover hidden architectural gems, the client would pass by this street on his nightly walks, wondering what was down the end of a quiet little cul de sac, he came upon a mid century gem untouched since the 50s. Overgrown and totally uninhabited, somehow he was able to track down the owner and convince him to sell the property.
It was an exciting process of discovery as we pored over the original drawings and looked to unearth any mid century gems that we could incorporate into the new design. Sadly, all of it needed to come out as the major asset of the house was the ‘O’ shape of the main living areas that overlooked the light drenched central courtyard.
The brief was to update the house in a way to be completely family friendly, capitalising on the natural light & view lines throughout a house that was permanently on show to itself, whilst being sympathetic to the mid century origins. All without a mid century cliché in sight.
Design Inspirations
We must admit though, the design inspiration for the house came straight out of the Palm Springs rule book in terms of wrapping the house in white inside & out. We wanted the house to have clean lines and a breezy-ness to it, so we removed all the complicated design elements, simplified the room flow, created new divisions and sliding doors which allowed the spaces to be open or closed off and we warmed up an essentially cool palette with timber floor & oak joinery.
Key products used:
We used a leather finish on the stone – something we haven’t tried before - but lends a deeply rippled surface texture to the stone, reminiscent of tough landscape terrains.
We played with the idea of creating graphic elements, again reminiscent of the 60s – with the diamond design feature panel behind the built in seat in the meals area, which was done by running the veneer grain in different directions.
What were the key challenges?
Often the greatest assets of a house can provide the biggest challenges. Here, it was working with the existing windows throughout the house whilst trying to create zones that could be closed off for more intimacy. That was tricky in a very open house.
