Get tickets to Dwell Open House: Los Angeles
SubscribeSign In
All Photos/living/furniture : bookcase/fireplace : wood burning/furniture : storage/furniture : chair/fireplace : standard layout

Living Room Bookcase Wood Burning Fireplace Storage Chair Standard Layout Fireplace Design Photos and Ideas

Sometimes all it takes is a little luck. For a young married couple, it came in the form of this rare find: a 19th-century, three-story, single-family home in the heart of Paris. The building was a charmer with good bones, but was in need of some serious care. In a vibrant retrofit by architect Pierre-Louis Gerlier that includes structural reinforcements, the reimagined design is set off with a new floor plan. The lower level now serves as a space for the couple’s children, with the public areas—including an open-plan living/dining room and kitchen—on the floor above. Upstairs, the attic has been transformed into a very large primary bedroom with a green-and-white bathroom suite. The living room (pictured) showcases the firm’s bespoke carpentry work with a beautiful, mossy-green built-in bookcase that frames a new fireplace, and a staircase surrounded by arched doorways that hold hidden storage. “We created visual breakthroughs in order to connect the different spaces,” says Gerlier. “The rounded arches are there to help magnify these moments.”
A collaboration between YUN Architecture and interior designer Penelope August, a renovated, 19th-century townhouse with landmark status used to be an egg and poultry distributor. Now virtually unrecognizable, the parlor floor is the home's open-plan living area. A formerly defunct fireplace was reactivated and clad with a custom-made, limestone mantle.
"I always knew there had to be a sight line from the living room to the kitchen, all the way to the back of the house," says Alex. "That really opened up everything [like], ‘Oh, yeah, this is the way it's supposed to be.’"
Floor-to-ceiling shelves and storage bookend a cabinet that conceals the television.
The pair replaced the cluttered firewood storage with a floating hearth that can double as a seat and display for art.
Raj and Watts extended the fireplace column to the ceiling to highlight the room’s expansive scale, and had it coated in concrete plaster. It was important to retain the wood-burning fireplace—a rarity in the city—but “we wanted to re-clad it in a material that also spoke to the industrial past of the building,” says Raj.
The artwork is titled "Crashing Buffalo" and is by Tucson/Los Angeles artist Ishi Glinsky.
The Adrian Pearsall sofa was sourced from The Swanky Abode on 1st Dibs, and the fire tools are also from the Sunshine Shop, a local vintage store.
Jon's living room is anchored with a double-faced concrete masonry chimney with indoor and outdoor functionality. The steel stairs on the left lead up to a mezzanine study area.
The Valles Suite screams rustic luxury with warm textiles and accents, contemporary furnishings, a wood-burning fireplace, and natural elements.