Renovations

Brandon and Amy set up different workstations in the living area.

Finding a home in the Cincinnati suburb of Wyoming was easy for this well-traveled family. The tricky part was reimagining and renovating the space to match their desired aesthetic. But, after four years, the house was transformed into the family’s modern oasis.

The horizontal layout of the home allows for easy movement throughout the interior, while the line of the continuous roof seems to extend into the trees. Enlarging the opening of the home allowed for impressive views of the river and surrounding area.

The renovated kitchen.

By foregoing a fixed dining table in favor of a large American walnut wood countertop by Cuisine Elysee, the couple is able to enjoy a open space with a clear view of the back of the house and the garden terrace outside.

Crestwood Renovation Floor Plan

The carport leads to the entrance.

The second-floor office is housed inside a rounded rectangle of concrete that the architect inserted on top of the old farmhouse.

"The most challenging part of the design was fusing the old part of the house with the new addition," says principal architect Alex Terry. The character and architectural integrity of the single-level 1950s ranch house was thoughtfully reconsidered during the addition and remodel. The home’s front porch, typical of the period, was refreshed with Ipe decking and railing.

The duo added custom redwood cabinetry on the dining area side. The pendants are from Birchwood Lighting.

In the main bathroom, Art Deco crown molding reminds residents of the house’s past. New fixtures include white laminate cabinets and sinks and faucets by Roger Seller.

Saved from demolition, stripped of awkward alterations, and faithfully restored, these rehabbed homes prove how timeless midcentury design can be.

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Benjamin Moore's Vintage Vogue paint coats the exterior.

Berkus has gone through over 1,000 renovations in his career and has learned some key design lessons along the way. “I have such a passion for discovering and reusing vintage building materials and architectural savage,” Berkus says. “In my last home in New York, I found a set of four doorknobs with locks from Belgium in the 1940s and I had iron glass doors installed to work around them. I knew myself to know that the knobs I touched everyday would be something meaningful to me.” Pictured, an enclosed porch in a rundown rustic cabin in Big Bear, California, updated by Lukas Machnik. Photo courtesy NBC.

A family in Hamburg, Germany, turned a kitschy turn-of-the-century villa into a high-design home with a few exterior tricks, including sheathing the exterior in one-dimensional, murdered-out black.

"It only cost about $48,000 to build, which was incredibly cheap," says Turner of the Stealth Barn. "We got the Timber Frame Company to supply the shell, then we clad it and fitted out the interior and windows ourselves. The idea was to take the archetypal black tar-painted agricultural building and make an almost childlike icon of that."

“When you’re working on something inexpensive and then decide you don’t like it, fine. You’re not tearing down millions of kroners worth of work.” —Mette Lyng Hansen

He added floor-to-ceiling windows by Andersen, which allow low winter sunlight to warm the interior in colder months.