Viewed from the street, Garden House in Los Angeles’s Atwater Village recedes into the scenery of Spanish-style dwellings, obscured by hedges, succulents, and strawberry trees. But beyond the cedar fencing, it’s a welcoming oasis opened up and oriented around the side and rear gardens.

A few simple alterations recast the composition of the domestic space in relation to the outdoors. Design, Bitches partners Catherine Johnson and Rebecca Rudolph removed a garage at the end of the driveway and excised the dining room and side entrance protruding into the side yard. In their place, an L-shaped deck wraps around the back of the house and a cedar-skinned guesthouse perches at the edge of the lot.

“That really changed the relationship of the house to the rest of the property and allowed [the clients] to take advantage of the outdoor space and make this the kind of oasis that they were looking for,” says Rudolph, cofounder of the 10-year-old architecture office.

Before: Dining Room

The dining room became an outdoor deck space with a built-in cedar bench, taking advantage of Southern California’s year-round warm weather, furnished with teal cushions and a purple dining table that complement the remodeled kitchen. Exposed beams of the hipped rooftop extended over the patio add a warm tone and a view of the rafter valley framing.

After: Dining Patio

“We’re definitely influenced by the natural environment in Southern California: the light, the shadow, the brightness, and the contrast,” Rudolph says. “We like to play with that and also try to take advantage as much as we can of these connections—either between inside and outside visually, or just in the interior with the kind of spaces that would make you feel comfortable and relaxed.”

Before: Kitchen

A sliding glass door, triangular transom, wall-to-wall windows, Douglas fir custom cabinets, and an island in the kitchen replaced the dining room and a dimly lit kitchen formerly separated by glass blocks.

After: Kitchen

Johnson and Rudolph lifted the ceiling, removing the coved edges and arched doorway opening, and installed teal-painted plywood cabinets as a separator between the kitchen and living room. The kitchen island is topped with wax-finished Minerit paneling, and the underside of the breakfast bar is painted purple, matching the outdoor dining table and chairs.

“Something that runs through our work is the informality [of] the California lifestyle where things feel like they can be adapted or changeable,” says Rudolph. “You can sit on them or live in them in different ways, and you can make it your own, and it’s not being defined specifically for you. It’s not rigid.”

Before: Laundry Room

After: Main Bedroom and Bath

Design, Bitches extended the room further into the yard and converted it into a main bedroom, lit from wall-to-wall with dual-glazed, low-e sliding doors, windows, and transoms. Douglas fir plywood cabinets separate the bed from the bathroom.

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Heath Ceramics manufactured the aqua bathroom tiles, which are handmade in California, and American Universal Penny made the round and unglazed hexagonal floor tiles. Johnson and Rudolph used Douglas fir and Corian for the custom-made vanity.

“We mix them in with materials that have more craft to them or are handmade but are a little more elevated,” Rudolph says.

Before: Living Room

The living room has a new mantle with Ann Sacks tiles, and the chimney stack has been replaced and clad in cedar. Straight-grain Douglas fir plywood wall divides it from the main bathroom.

“We like to create places that—if they’re public spaces—people want to return to again and again and where they feel comfortable, and where all kinds of people feel comfortable,” say the designers. “Part of that is creating a light and joyful atmosphere, and part of that is using familiar, everyday materials.”

Before: Backyard

All of that maximizes the interior, but the result was to orient the house around the backyard, turning it into a landscaped courtyard. The clients—a doctor and filmmaker originally from Detroit—wanted the home to be a place they could stay in forever with more connection to the outside.

After: Backyard

Cedar decking and Minerit cement board paves a pathway to the guesthouse, landscaped in between with low-allergen, low-maintenance, low-water plantings of hedges, sage with purple flowers, pepper trees, succulents, and citrus trees watered by gray water recycled from the house. The aloe trees in the side yard are propagated from Rudolph’s own house.

“We really value our collaboration with our clients and their interests, personalities, and passions,” Rudolph says. “Every project is different because we’re drawing on what the clients are interested in, but we’re also trying to give them more than they could have expected by bringing the playfulness and lightness and color to it.”

More Before & After:

An Interior Designer Rescues a California Desert Cabin From Drab Finishes

A Riverside Cabin in Oregon Gets a Blindingly Bright Renovation

A Classic NYC Loft Ditches Its ’90s Look for Refined Minimalism

Project Credits:

Architect: Design, Bitches / @design_bitches

Builder: Southland Builders

Structural Engineer: The Office of Gordon L. Polon

Landscape Design: Design, Bitches

Appears In

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