Renovations

Designer Jeff Sand’s Universal Chairs combine his love for classic French café chairs with an appreciation for “the beautiful metal casings on an old Moto Guzzi.” Sand Studios also designed the dining table and pendant lamp.

The pair painted the upstairs master bedroom white, and added a G55 sling chair and leather baskets from their recent design collections. The carpet is from a souk in Casablanca, and the bedcover is from Zara Home. Atop the vintage cup-board is an artwork by Vereecke’s father. Verheyden incorporated all-new woodwork of his design into the room.

The Citrons inherited the Modernica sofa, chaise, and table from the previous owners. They added a Jasper Morrison cork stools, all by Vitra. The cedar interior walls were inspired by the exterior cladding and are finished in orange oil beeswax by Howard.

The kitchen is completely open to the main living area and features a custom birch pegboard wall. Eames dining chairs accent the space.

The challenge of renovating an iconic midcentury house is surely a daunting one for any architect, but apply this formula to a Richard Neutra house, and the responsibility rises exponentially. This was the situation for Los Angeles–based architect Peter Grueneisen, founder and principal of Los Angeles–based Nonzero Architecture, who inherited the task of taking on significant updates to an already-altered Neutra—the 1949 Freedman House in Pacific Palisades, California.

The entire house is painted in one color: Sherwin Williams' Ibis White.

The flooring in the hallway, and elsewhere in the apartment, is manor oak by Kährs. Photo by Jim Stephenson.

Architects Sara and Jeremy Imhoff and their son Jonah use the renovated kitchen in their 1918 bungalow in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood.

A door frame was preserved as "a sculptural memory piece," Sara Imhoff says, after a wall separating the old kitchen from a small dining room was demolished. The countertops and backsplash are by Caesarstone.

At the top of the stairwell, a sitting area is outfitted with a vintage Eames lounge, a large Jack Goldstein painting, and a 1970s light fixture found by Marcovitz in Paris. Photo by João Canziani.

The central staircase is a key element of the scheme. With the bedrooms and bathroom located on the entrance level, it was crucial to create an intuitive and inviting flow up toward the more social areas. On the upper floor, the central staircase divides and defines an otherwise open plan.