This Halloween I’m apparently a zombie, because this newsletter is back from the dead.
I’ll update you soon with my goings on and some more of my typical cool house content, but for now enjoy this special edition brought to you by my sheer obsession with Halloween.

Have fun checking out your neighbors’ houses trick or treating tonight, or whatever you’re going to get up to.

Practical Magic

Location: 9 Little Nahant Rd, Nahant, MA 01908
List Price: $5,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/9-Little-Nahant-Rd-Nahant-MA-01908/56947995_zpid/

This home in coastal Massachusetts is the closest thing I’ve ever seen to a real-life version of the iconic Practical Magic house. Sure, one is Queen Anne and the other is Second Empire, but if you softly focus your eyes, you can almost hear children crying, “witch, witch, you’re a witch.”

Ironically, the house that resembles the epitome of girlhood homes was originally designed to be a “Gentleman’s Residence” for Thomas Howe, a merchant from nearby Boston, to use in the Summers.

Architects Wait & Cutter, best known for having designed Lowell City Hall and the Middlesex County Courthouses in Cambridge, built the home in 1880. It was one of the first on Little Nahant. Nahant is probably best known as the basis for Lovecraft, Massachusetts- the fictional town in the spooky comic book and television series Locke & Key, written by Joe Hill (the son of Stephen King).

The major treat of this home is that it underwent a multi-million-dollar restoration project in 2023, after going on the auction block in 2020 in a state of complete disrepair. The developer who purchased the property worked with the Nahant Historical Society to document the process, which you can check out here. You can also check out some before-and-after photos here. The trick is that the interior designer had virtually everything, including the custom millwork, painted white.

Having a bay window and a seating alcove, especially one with special curved detailing like this, makes the primary bedroom basically the bedroom of my childhood dreams, but the styling makes this entirely chic coastal grandmother. The best spot in the house is probably in this bathtub, from which you can admire a view of the bay through a porthole-like window.

The other most magical spot in the home is the tower. Back in the day, the daughters of Howe would invite local schoolchildren up to the tower to view the night skies through a telescope. Now, it’s more likely to be used to curl up with a book from the two-story library or take in the view of the entire area, including Boston in the distance.

The only thing missing from this house is a greenhouse for growing plants for potions, maybe a few broomsticks for coven meetings.

Colgate Mansion

Location: 138 Amenia Road, Sharon, CT 06069
List Price: $7,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/138-Amenia-Rd-Sharon-CT-06069/82596455_zpid/

The Colgate mansion (formally named “Filston”) was designed in 1903 for Mr. and Mrs. Romulus Colgate. Yes, those Colgates. “Rome” was the grandson of the founder of the company that would become the Colgate-Palmolive company we know (and many hate) today. Rome might be the person who has been a source of your personal nightmares (or at least headaches) without realizing it. He made his personal fortune in hydroelectric power, ultimately helping to start what became PG&E, and the lead paint brand Dutch Boy.

If eclectic styles drive you mad, this house is going to be your nightmare. Colgate worked with architect William Cromwell, Jr. to create a blend of Italianate Renaissance Revival, Palladian, Neo-Gothic, and French Empire styles, and Mrs. Colgate crafted the interiors to incorporate French Empire, Louis XIV, and Louis XV styles.

In addition to being particularly dramatic in the fog, the great hall is a beautiful example of this mishmash. All of the details of this home appear to be either impeccably maintained or beautifully restored. I adore the patterned wood floor. You can’t tell from this angle, but it mirrors the trim pattern on the ceiling.

My favorite area from the limited photos we have of the home is the library/drawing room. The herringbone floors, detailed trim, bookcases on every wall, and an oversized carved fireplace give it a cozy dark academia feeling, while still having a nice amount of natural light so it’s not too stuffy.

From the main bedrooms, you get a view across Filston’s 106 acres of rolling hills and woodlands, a formal garden, a reflecting pond with lily pads, and this creepy, derelict pond with a headless statue that is definitely not haunted.

There’s also a 5,700-square-foot, three-story carriage house on its own dedicated parcel for any guests brave enough to visit.

American Horror Story

Location: 2003 Dumaine St, New Orleans, LA 70116
List Price: $350,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2003-Dumaine-St-New-Orleans-LA-70116/84446201_zpid/

New Orleans is supposedly the most haunted city in America, and this home is putting in major work to support that reputation. Maison Vitry was built for Louise Vitry, a free woman of color, in 1855. The home must have been stunning when it was first built. It has floor-to-ceiling windows, substantial trim, ceiling medallions, and marble fireplaces. Ms. Vitry died in 1867 and is rumored to have haunted the house ever since. I can’t blame her for not wanting to leave something so beautiful.

Unfortunately, very little appears to have changed or even been well-maintained since Ms. Vitry’s departure (or lack thereof), and the home is quite literally falling apart. Whether the continued disrepair is caused by the hauntings, which the owner claims have driven several contractors and plumbers to quit, or the enormity of the scope of work to restore the home, we may never know.

The crumbling plaster and peeling paint give it a certain je ne sais pas that the film industry loves. The home has been the set of multiple photo shoots and television shows, most notably American Horror Story: Coven. Maison Vitry was also featured in HGTV’s show Scariest House in America. The owners were not shy about disclosing the spirits living in this house. “We definitely have some constant spirits that let themselves be heard quite loudly to the point that there’s no chance of sleeping,” the owner stated. To make matters even creepier, the home caught fire earlier this year.

Despite the hauntings, this home does have good bones. If a buyer with enough cash and enough guts was willing to take on the task of restoring this place, they would be rewarded with a beautiful home.

The Jump Scare

Location: 19 E Main St, Salem, NJ 08079
List Price: $300,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/19-E-Main-St-Salem-NJ-08079/455516797_zpid/

This home in Salem, NJ gives me a rush like Wednesday Addams watching Legally Blonde.

From the outside, you see a charming Victorian with some Gothic details.

And on the inside, it’s… newly renovated with all grey finishes.

The listing describes it as “the epitome of Main Street Americana meets modern home design” and has “all the HGTV vibes.” If you’re a subscriber, this likely ran chills down your spine. If you’re a normal person, this might be your dream home.

The good news either way is that it looks like they kept the original layout and didn’t turn it into a completely open layout. Plus, at least the flooring isn’t grey? There’s plenty of potential to add character back into this house, even if you don’t want to go full Goth.

Bonus

• I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that this beautiful but decrepit mansion in Brooklyn is the house all of the neighborhood kids will be daring each other to go near this Halloween.

• There’s a schoolhouse in Maine listed for $275k perfect for living out your spooky (or cute!) Stephen King dreams.

Beyond Paris, the Olympics and Emily in Paris also share two things: audacity and mixing old with the new. Nothing moves me quite like someone having a bold new vision for something and fully committing to achieving that vision. It’s equally true about home design, creating an Olympic opening ceremony outside the confines of a stadium, or the bold outfits of Emily in Paris. It might not be my taste, but I have to respect it.

This issue’s apartments are the best mixtures of old and new that celebrate French history.

Renaissance Apartment

Location: Odéon - 6th Arrondissement
List Price: €2,190,000
Listing: https://www.proprietesparisiennes-sothebysrealty.com/en/paris-real-estate/ref-pp6-1004/sale-apartment-paris-3-rooms-75006/

It was le coup de foudre the second I saw this apartment. The apartment is on the noble floor of a 17th-century mansion, overlooking a quiet street. The most impactful thing when you come through the front door is the sheer volume of the space and the size of the windows in the back. But then as you trace your eyes up 4 meters (13 feet), you see the star of the show: hand-painted King Louis XIII-style ceiling beams.

The designers echo the ceiling colors across the apartment on the walls and doors and kept other original details like the stone fireplace and Versailles parquet flooring. Everything else in the apartment is a mixture of old and new.

Ordinarily, I wouldn’t be a fan of a modern white kitchen in a space like this, but here I think the wood tones complement the warm tones on the walls and the ceiling, and the white helps the focus be on the architecture of the space, instead of the cabinets.

I also love the soft white carpet and walls in the bedroom. It’s a moment of tranquility in a space (and a city) that has a lot going on. Although laying in bed and taking in the intricacies of a Renaissance ceiling sounds like a pretty chic alternative to counting sheep…

Art Deco Penthouse

Location: Muette - 16th Arrondisement
List Price: €15,100,000
Listing: https://www.proprietesparisiennes-sothebysrealty.com/en/paris-real-estate/ref-pp2-3003/sale-penthouse-paris-10-rooms-4-bedrooms-75016/

Where better to celebrate Art Deco architecture than the city where Art Deco was born? This penthouse duplex was recently renovated by its art collector owner with exacting standards to bring the apartment back to its roots. The materials and finishes were inspired by prominent French Art Deco designers such as Émile-Jacques Ruhlmann, Jean Royère, Albert Cheuret, and Jean-Michel Frank.

Having a conversation with the owner about the design process and all of the specific references they used would be so fascinating to me. I mean look at the details they paid attention to. The doors alone have a unique grain pattern, carved panels, and brass grills with fan-shaped perforations.

I’m also such a sucker for a classic bathroom like this. I love that they play with pattern on the floor tile, so it’s not you’re average checkerboard black and white. The custom stained glass (apparently designed by French architect Michel Roux-Spitz) is breathtaking, and it’s repeated in several spaces throughout the apartment.

But it’s not just the design details of the apartment that make it one of a kind. This 1400 sq ft apartment also has an incredible view of the Eiffel Tower and more than 500 sq. ft. of lush garden space on the top floor. It’s like having a personal Bois de Boulogne.

Gallery Penthouse

Location: St. Georges - 9th Arrondisement
List Price: €3,250,000
Listing: https://www.proprietesparisiennes-sothebysrealty.com/en/paris-real-estate/ref-pp6-1029/sale-apartment-paris-3-rooms-2-bedrooms-75009/

In my Emily-inspired fantasies about running away to Paris for a professional adventure (being an estate agent with Espaces Atypiques, naturally 💁‍♀️), this is exactly the kind of apartment I fantasize about living in. The main living space has tons of space for collecting art, furniture, and books- no doubt carrying on the legacy and intention of the man who built the mansion it’s housed in, internationally famous art dealer Adolphe Goupil.

The 7-meter-high (23 feet) ceiling is capped with a skylight running the length of the space, flooding the apartment with natural light and showcasing the enormous, detailed crown molding. The loft-style mezzanine level has a front-row seat to the details. I can’t imagine a more inspiring home office- surrounded by all of your books, art, and the historic beauty of the space.

And just in case you don’t want to feel like you’re living in an art gallery all the time, the bedroom offers a more traditional Parisian apartment feeling with a Juliette balcony overlooking the street. A second patio with greenery is just off the bathroom.

Art Nouveau Duplex

Location: 8th Arrondisement
List Price: €2,950,000
Listing: https://www.architecturedecollection.fr/en/product/duplex-art-nouveau-jules-lavirotte-paris-8/

While the rest of the world may be losing its color, this apartment hasn’t gotten the memo. Housed in a former music salon of a private mansion designed in 1907 by famous Art Nouveau architect Jules Lavirotte, the apartment centers around a 6-meter high lounge with spectacular curved windows at the heart. The current owners oversaw an extensive renovation to recreate the original decor and bring the space back to its former splendor.

Almost every corner of the apartment has something you won’t find anywhere else. Round walls, colorful stained glass, and sinuous woodwork (the bathrooms and kitchen are still modern). Honestly, I think with the right touch you could renovate this apartment even further to honor its stylistic roots while also making sure that it feels modern and not like a time capsule.

Like I said, I love committing to a bold vision.

Bonus

• We can hate on Emily and the Olympic opening ceremony as being ringarde, but Aya Nakamura’s music video for Pookie proves that even the coolest artists use a similar aesthetic from time to time

• This charming Anglo-Norman-style townhouse steps away from where the Hästens campaign was placed is for sale for €2.6m.

• The next time I’m in Paris, I plan on doing this walking tour of the Art Nouveau and Art Deco buildings of the 16th, and not because Emily filmed the sunscreen launch party at the Piscine Molitor. If you wanted to do an Emily walking tour though, the city has you covered.

• Carol from Paris, Je T’aime will always be my original and favorite Emily in Paris

Unfortunately, I was not on a break from writing because I was sojourning in the English countryside like the ton. Well… maybe a little bit.

I never expected my return to be prompted by Bridgerton, but Penelope saying she felt like she was “losing a part of [her]self” by giving up writing was heartrending. I’ve been carrying around a similar sense of loss and I couldn’t take another second of beating myself up for disappearing anymore.

Truthfully, I’ve spent the past two years feeling like Sylvia Plath sitting at the base of a fig tree- unable to choose from the many paths branching out before me, partially out of a refusal to choose only one thing and partially out of fear. Much like Lord Kilmartin “If I am to be bold, I should need some time to think about it.” But the time has come to be bold. I quit my day job a few weeks ago and I’m ready to reclaim writing as well as whatever other opportunities unfold.

There’s much to catch you up on, but for now, here are this season’s diamonds.

Poston Court Estate

Location: Vowchurch, Hereford, Herefordshire, HR2
Guide Price: £9,550,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/134605700#/?channel=RES_BUY

Poston Court Estate is a 266-acre Grade II-listed property in Herefordshire. The house was designed in 1765 as a hunting lodge for Sir Edward Boughton by the architect Sir William Chambers, who was essentially the official architect for King George III (for my fellow Americans- yes, that King George). The grounds are of a similar pedigree having been designed by Sir Thomas Robinson, who was master gardener to George III.

The heart of the home is the rotunda, a circular, domed dining room with sweeping views of the countryside.

Over the centuries, the home has had cycles of disrepair and renewal. At one point hens were even found nesting in the rotunda. More recently the house has had a series of owners committed to restoring the architecture to fully embody Chambers’ vision while tastefully bringing the decor into modern times.

The latest renovation, designed by Francis Sultana, reminds me of Penelope Featherington’s glow-up. They both have a lot of regency features but in a more refined, mature, and pared-back way. They’re both unafraid to stand out. Plus, the jade color of the primary suite reminds me of the Featherington’s house and Penelope’s dresses this season. The bedroom even has feather decor!

The handpainted silk chinoiserie wallpaper in the bedroom is an excellent nod to Chambers’ Great Pagoda in Kew Gardens. I’m also obsessed with the choice to fully cover the bathroom in a jade Italian marble with lots of movement. It’s a bold move that still feels soft and romantic and balances the traditional and modern so well.

The other buildings onsite center around a courtyard and formal garden. They include a similarly stylish three-bedroom Poston Lodge, four-bedroom Poston Cottage, studio-turned-home office, and a summer house pavilion housing an orangerie, summer dining room, and indoor pool. There’s a tennis court and kitchen garden just behind.

You can find additional pictures of the interiors and learn more about the renovation in this House & Garden article.

Serene in Surrey

Location: High Elms, Laleham, Surrey
Guide Price: £2,750,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/147492839#/?channel=RES_BUY

Much like the Bridgerton’s house, this Grade II-listed home in Surrey is draped in Wisteria, but thankfully, this Wisteria is not CGI.

Every room on the ground floor is oriented towards the well-manicured gardens. From the moment you step in through the front door, you’re drawn into a tranquil drawing room with a bay window overlooking the front garden, then on to a large orangerie that functions as the sun-drenched living room of the home, and finally outside.

Upstairs you’ll find serene bedrooms with delicate details. The house is tied together by an oak winding staircase crowned with an octagonal cupola that brings in the sunlight.

Everything about this house feels calm and peaceful- exactly the kind of place that would be perfect for Francesca Bridgerton.

The Ivy

Location: The Ivy, Bath Road, Chippenham, Wiltshire, SN15
Guide Price: £2,500,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/147439220#/?channel=RES_BUY

The Ivy is exactly what I imagine would happen if someone like Benedict Bridgerton came into their own. The Baroque Grade I-listed house retains all of the period details, but the materials and styling make them feel less fussy and more lived-in. Fashion designer Liza Bruce and her husband have made it into the perfect canvas for their creativity.

Stacks of contemporary art leaning against the walls and disco ball chandeliers are perfect for the artist/party boy persona.

My favorite room in the house is the drawing room. Every surface has detailed carvings, and paired with the owner’s postmodern interior sensibilities it proves sometimes more is more.

This bedroom in particular feels like a modern, eclectic twist on Lady Tilley Arnold’s bedroom.

The house sits on over four acres featuring a lake, woodland, and many magical gardens. The gardens were designed by Julian and Isabel Bannerman, award-winning garden designers who have designed gardens for many of the ton including King Charles III. They specialize in creating romantic, stately country gardens “with a dreamy ‘left alone’ quality.” The Ivy blends tradition and a bohemian sensibility in a way that perfectly captures the essence of Benedict.

Lyegrove House

Location: Lyegrove, Badminton, South Gloucestershire
Guide Price: £12,500,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/136640150#/?channel=RES_BUY

While it’s not quite The Badminton Estate (one of the primary filming locations for Bridgerton and Queen Charlotte), Lyegrove House is as close as you could possibly get. The Grade II*-listed house was once a part of the estate, and the property is still neighbored by it. But this house is magnificent in its own right.

The house is arranged around a central courtyard, which gives the home lots of natural light and views of gardens from every angle. The rooms are still decorated much like you would have seen during the days of Bridgerton. It makes it easy to imagine what their country home might be like.

Lyegrove house sits on 18.5 acres. The gardens are the centerpiece of the estate, with many formal features, but the owners also recently modernized the garden by working with Jinny Blom. There is also a small wood, lily pond, and tennis court. I highly recommend checking out this brochure for the estate; it has many more images of the garden, as well as interior photos of the other buildings.

In a renovation worthy of the ton, part of the original stables has been converted to create a fully-featured ”wellness suite” with an indoor swimming pool, gym, changing room, sauna, shower, and even a screening room. The pool has dramatic vaulted ceilings, large arched windows, and strong Neoclassical influences, which would have been very en vogue during the time of Bridgerton and is still chic today.

Expect more issues and updates soon!

Yours Truly,
Lady Whistledown
Ariel

And of course, when a famous musician/actor/sex symbol/fashion icon goes all in and chooses to promote his new album in Better Homes & Gardens he had my attention. The piece is a surprisingly touching reflection on home and growth and becoming who you are that endeared me to him because I’ve felt the same struggles in the same way.

It felt right to honor his reflections on home and album called Harry’s House with an issue about houses for Harry Styles. Surprisingly (or not depending on how you interpret his people-pleasing comments in BH&G!), most of Harry Styles’ architectural choices thus far have been fairly bland and conservative. So these choices are less about “What Would Harry Do?” when picking homes and more of an attempt to pick places that feel in line with who he portrays in his music and music videos, how he dresses, and how he has talked about himself and who he is becoming in his BH&G interview.

Now let’s tour Harry’s House(s).

London

Location: Russell Gardens Mews, London W14
List Price: £3,850,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/114410033

Harry’s House song pairings: “Music for a Sushi Restaurant” and “Cinema”

Tucked away at the end of a quiet dead-end cobblestone street is a surprisingly joyful home. From the front, you might mistake the home for any other mews house, but beyond the blue mirrored steel door is a colorful modernist home that surprises around every turn.

The side of the house, which contains the top floors of the home, mimics the façade of the adjacent mews houses and successfully camouflages the modernist section from the street. Most of the house is a minimalist white with bright bursts of Wisteria purple, citron, or Zinnia pink. The ground floor opens up to a private garden space which continues the bold colors outside, but outside the colors are mostly softened by the numerous flowering plants.

Inside you’ll find a different experience on every floor. The upper floors are airy and bright white, while downstairs you’ll find moodier spaces with dramatic lightwells and high shine materials that match the bold colors from the ground floor. The finishes make what could otherwise be a dark, sleepy space lively and energetic.

Construction of the house was documented on Grand Designs (Series 11 Episode 7) and was aptly named “The Disco Home”. The nightclub ambiance is complete with a conversation pit in the movie room, courtyard koi pond aerated by a waterfall fountain, video projection dance floor, and DJ booth.

For balance, the house also has a wellness suite with a sauna, steam room, and zen spa-like bath just down the hall.

And just in case you thought this house was a little too over-the-top bachelor pad, just keep in mind that this house was designed for a family of four to have fun spending time together.

Cheshire

Location: Norcliffe Hall Drive, Styal, Cheshire
List Price: £1,700,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/122916050

Harry’s House song pairings: “Grapejuice” and “Little Freak”

This renovated Tudor house felt like the right fit for a more mellow Harry. It looks straight out of Harry’s Better Homes & Gardens photo shoot (you can tour the actual home from the shoot here) and is in the Cheshire countryside, not far from where Harry grew up.

Inside the house has a beautiful blend of Tudor details, softened by a warm neutral palette and minimalist, modern built-ins. There are plenty of places to curl up with a book and a cup of tea, or sit and write a song. It’s a very grounding space that feels like everything I conjure up when I think of home, even though it’s nothing like where I grew up.

Almost every room on the ground floor opens up to the gardens, and there are several areas dedicated to enjoying the most whatever-the-British-version-of-coastal-grandmother lifestyle you can imagine. There’s a solarium with planting benches, two outdoor dining areas, raised garden beds, and even a porch swing. They seriously look out of a Nancy Meyers movie.

There’s even an additional 1,200 sq ft organic-modern-style guest cottage on the property. It’s currently being used by the owner as an office for their architecture practice, but it would make a recording studio or practice space with immaculate vibes.

The only thing missing is a natural pool for Harry to take a dip (Mallard duck sweater not required).

New York

Location: 226 E 49th St, New York, NY 10017
List Price: $10,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/226-228-E-49th-St-New-York-NY-10017/31530211_zpid/

Harry’s House song pairings: “As It Was” and “Daylight”

There’s something beautiful and melancholy about living in a New York apartment that feels like you’re in Europe. That must be why there’s a poem by Le Duc Charles Orléans inscribed on the ceiling in the great room that reads (roughly translated): “Go away, go, go, care, sadness, and melancholy.” But maybe that’s exactly what makes this space the right fit for someone like Harry who talks/sings about homesickness and not liking long distance relationships. This 8,700 sq ft home in Turtle Bay Gardens feels like a great compromise, or at least a stylish one.

The Turtle Bay Gardens neighborhood was essentially created by a Gilded Age heiress who in 1918 used her railroad money to buy an entire block of townhouses. She worked with architects to update the façades to look more European, create a shared garden amongst them, and reorient the houses so the main living areas were facing the garden. She built the grandest for herself by combining two townhouses and bringing in all of the materials she loved from her travels in Europe.

The effects are amazing. The house is truly transportive. While it would be hard to pull yourself away from the great room and its 22ft coffered ceilings, my favorite room in the house is the green room on the ground floor that opens up directly to the garden. It is the perfect kind of place for throwing open the doors and refreshing the mood in the spring, or cozying up in a sweater in the fall. You could get a lot of reflection and writing done here.

Of course, the same could also be said for the wood-paneled library.

On the top floor is a quintessential artist studio with large skylights, which provides that kind of iconic New York creative space even when the rest of the house feels straight from Italy.

It’s easy to see why this home has attracted artists and designers (ahem, Mary Kate Olsen and Olivier Sarkozy are the current owners) were attracted to this place and why the neighborhood has been home to people like Bob Dylan, Katharine Hepburn, E. B. White, and more. It might be the most romantic place in New York.

Los Angeles

Location: 3409 Oak Glen Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90068
List Price: $3,200,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3409-Oak-Glen-Dr-Los-Angeles-CA-90068/20044984_zpid/

Harry’s House song pairings: “Daydreaming” and “Satellite”

Harry sings a lot about LA vibes, and what could have more LA vibes than a quiet well-preserved mid-century modern house in the hills?

This house in the Hollywood Hills is almost a perfect time capusle. Warm tones flow throughout with exposed wooden beams on the ceiling, wood panels and brick on the walls, cork floors, brass hardware, and an orange built-in sofa. It has a retro charm that feels very current and perfect for someone like Harry who likes to wear vintage silhouettes in modern ways.

My favorite area inside of the home is the living area with the built-in bar and brick fireplace. It has a perfect entertaining ambiance. The kind of spot you could put on a record, pour a martini, and dance, or on cooler nights cuddle up by the fireplace with an old fashioned.

If relaxing and recovery is more your style, the house has a beautiful private backyard space with a pool, hot tub, and sauna secluded by lots of greenery. It’s the perfect place to soak up every bit of the beautiful LA weather year round.

Bonus

• A townhouse in Southeast London with a very Harry mixture of traditional, modern, brutalist, and 70’s aesthetics

• This modernist home in Surrey with a recording studio is an Architectural Digest feature waiting to happen

• Fellow celeb with great style, Emily Ratajkowski’s Echo Park house is listed for $2.2m

• A London loft that has serious LA mid-century vibes

• A very house-shaped house in London that has a soothing modern take on traditional features

I’ve also been thinking about the physical space of childhood in large part because of Meg Conley’s extremely moving piece about letting go. Our homes, schools, and neighborhoods are their entire worlds, and they’ve probably been your entire world too for the past couple of years. So why not make them spaces of safety, fun, creativity, play, and wonder?

Here are the houses I find most inspirational for raising a family.

The Greenhouse

Location: Murray Street London NW1
List Price: £2,350,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/113049857

You would never know walking by the non-descript, mostly black exterior in a town known for being dreary that there could be a wonderland for both adults and children behind these windows. The space used to be a workshop that made clothing samples for a high street fashion brand. The current owner, artist Francesca Anfossi, made major renovations to the flat including creating bedroom spaces in the basement and infused vibrancy and personality throughout.

Upstairs you’ll find a bright, open entertaining space brimming with artwork and personalized touches. Splashes of bold colors and patterns add a striking modern flair, while the space is grounded by the original features like the brick fireplace. Cyan and yellow are used throughout in a way that feels almost like the primary you see used in most children’s things but subtly tweaked to be high design for adults too (and a great nod to print).

My favorite room in the house is the conservatory, which has been converted into a playroom with easy access to the private garden. It’s a space that is bursting with life in many ways, with abundant natural light, natural plants, and bright children’s toys and furniture strewn about. Francesca used to use the space as her studio, and it’s easy to see why. I think you’d be hard-pressed to find a more energizing space in London.

Francesca told The Modern House her kids “love to run and cycle around the house – it’s like a constant race. And they like to play hide and seek, and this place is perfect for that.”

Downstairs you’ll find the bedrooms which use the same color palette plus some more subdued variations. The children’s room is still quite playful, even adding citron stripes to the ceiling. The stripes throughout the space conjure up imagery of things like circuses, camping, and pool umbrellas- all places of play and unwinding.

Overall, this home feels like a highly considered place for kids to grow up where the adults and kids can have a little fun and not shy away from play and color.

The Garden

Location: 19 Padlock Rd, West Wratting, Cambridge CB21 5LS, UK
List Price: £1,450,000
Listing: https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/119662595

You can practically hear the humming of dragonflies and buzzing of bees from the garden of this home. The Prospect House was the personal (and self-designed home) of architect Jonathan Ellis-Miller. Ellis-Miller was inspired by the Case Study Houses and specifically wanted to create a version of these modernist designs for his family that specifically worked for family life.

The open floor plan home has windows on all four sides, which makes it an incredible backdrop to the garden and makes the interior spaces more adaptable. While not a fully reconfigurable design- like some of Ellis-Miller’s other residential projects- the house does have rooms that can be adapted through the use of screens. This creates the opportunity for privacy or connection depending on the mood, which is especially great for families with older kids.

Everything about the home is focused on the gardens. The simple materials make the outdoors the focal point, and each of the spaces is connected to the outdoors via a sliding glass door.

It’s the kind of place where a kid could run freely in the yard, learn about plants and animals and how to tend to a garden, and lead a life that is intimately in tune with the seasons. What could be better than that?

The Tents

Location: 6880 E Windstone Trl, Scottsdale, AZ 85266
List Price: $3,750,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/6880-E-Windstone-Trl-Scottsdale-AZ-85266/55268125_zpid/

There is nothing more quintessential to childhood to me than a tent. Even the least outdoorsy among us likely built tents out of blankets and chairs in our living rooms or begged our parents to set up a camping tent in the backyard. To me, this house has some of that childhood tent energy, just in a more grown-up and permanent form.

The main house consists of two dome-like structures that feel kind of like if you tried to make giant versions of those super cool geodesic dome tents with industrial-scale Tinker Toys. Every room in the house feels the effect of the design and has windows looking out to take advantage of the 5 acres of scenery, although the structure constantly reminds you that you’re basically inside of a tent.

The two structures are connected by this giant arched living and kitchen area with exposed metal rafters. The clerestory windows bring in a ton of natural light and further emphasize the tent vibes of the house, drawing your eyes up and making the line between inside and outside fuzzy.

And for a little extra playhouse bonus points, there is a large pool and hot tub in the backyard.

The Treehouse

Location: 390 Gemstone Ln, Berkeley Springs, WV 25411
List Price: $1,950,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/390-Gemstone-Ln-Berkeley-Springs-WV-25411/22864979_zpid/

This modernist home in West Virginia reminds me of another kind of architecture that children are always drawn to: treehouses. While this house isn’t all wooden and perched up super high, it has an architectural feature that shows off how just how treehouse-like it really is: tree tubes.

There’s something a little science museum about having two trees growing through your living space. They’re unexpected and a touch whimsical and they make a design statement about blending the indoors and the outdoors. They throw off the perfect balance of the space in order to make room for something more interesting and beautiful to happen– kind of like children.

The modernist house also has the rooms carved out of the middle, leaving these open hallways the length of the house. It’s easy to imagine a kid running or scooting down the hall here– a feeling made even freer by the floor-to-ceiling windows and tall ceilings.

Bonus

• If you want to read more about how design shapes childhood, I highly recommend the book The Design of Childhood by my favorite design critic Alexandra Lange.

• Inspired by the houses from this issue, I’ve decided to learn more about gardening and birdwatching. My friends at Breeze put together a specialized search just for birdwatching that has been super helpful for me to get started. I also added these books to my reading list recently A More Exciting Life: A Guide to Greater Freedom, Spontaneity, and Enjoyment and Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul

• Domino Magazine is always a huge source of inspiration for me, especially their content about kids’ rooms. These are some of my favorite kids’ rooms they’ve featured: Hilary Duff’s kids’ rooms, this line of furniture that gives cardboard vibes in the best way possible, this bright kids’ room with a reading nook, and (surprise!) an all-white kids’ room I actually love.

• I’m simply obsessed with Poppy Brent-Berkus’ room from her family’s previous home. I love the pink carpet and plush bed, the floral wallpaper, and how she was able to push her neutral-loving dads (she’s the daughter of famous interior designers Jeremiah Brent and Nate Berkus) out of their usual box. I can’t wait to see what she comes up with next.

• If I had a kid, I’d buy them some of these Vans and live vicariously through them.

  They also have me wondering what a Warped Tour for kids would be like 🤔

They manage to have incredibly successful careers without sacrificing taking Goop-level care of themselves, having close-knit friendships with people they see regularly, or building families. And yeah, looking like a model and having heaps of money don’t hurt, but it’s not what I’m envious of. These women have balance, and not just in Louboutins. This year, my resolution is to capture a little bit of their energy for myself.

This issue is all about the lavish Los Angeles area compounds that have Selling Sunset-level glamour (and equally unreal price tags).

The Californication Compound

Location: 3947 Markridge Rd, La Crescenta, CA 91214
List Price: $9,799,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3947-Markridge-Rd-La-Crescenta-CA-91214/20100010_zpid/

This property has not one, but two homes by notable architects perched on 5.7 acres in the foothills bordering Angeles National Forest.

The original house is a charming Richard Neutra, which he designed for his secretary in 1953. It features built-ins throughout, including multiple built-in desks, shelving systems, and seating areas, which help define spaces in the mostly open house.

The main living area is defined by a built-in sofa system that includes a record player and concealed speakers with storage along the back, anchored by a two-sided fireplace. I’m also completely over the moon for this built-in desk flanked by floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides in the more private seating area.

The newer house is a modern seven-sided structure with an interior courtyard, designed by the architect Michael Maltzan. The house features mostly living spaces in the bright and open upstairs and private secondary spaces in the bunker-like downstairs.

My favorite room in this house is the primary bedroom. I love the juxtaposition of the subterranean concrete bunker feeling with the airiness of the glass and its connection to the plants on the hillside, almost like an ultramodern version of an Icelandic turf house. Plus, I appreciate the simplicity of a bedroom with just the bed facing out towards the view.

The thing that really sold me on this house though is the bathroom. I’m a sucker for a bathroom with bath features at the center of the room, especially when they don’t look like run-of-the-mill bathroom fixtures. I also love the contrast of the sharp angles throughout the house with all of the round elements in the bathroom. The light blue penny tile definitely conjures up feelings of soap bubbles. The placement of the round skylight over the shower and the round window at the towel bar are playful touches I also love.

Oh yeah, and did I mention that the current owner is Flea (bassist for the band Red Hot Chili Peppers)? Bet you didn’t see that one coming.

The Sicilian Stahl

Location: 8201 Bellgave Pl, Los Angeles, CA 90069
List Price: $48,000,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/8201-Bellgave-Pl-Los-Angeles-CA-90069/20797681_zpid/

Imagine if the Stahl House and Disney Concert Hall were blended together to create a residence built in Italy but somehow also overlooking LA.

It’s a combination that seems like it should only exist in the Instagram realm of renderporn, but the house actually exists in the Hollywood Hills (not far from the Stahl House itself) and is for sale for an equally surreal $48 million.

The home is designed by SAOTA in collaboration with Woods + Dangaran - the same firms that designed the $35 million mansion from Seasons 1 and 2 of Selling Sunset. It has all of the over-the-top luxury you would expect, but with a much more reserved, serene design sensibility. Most of the house is a very subdued palette of glass (naturally 💁‍♀️), white oak, white, and Italian travertine. The travertine grounds the vast, airy space and creates the Italian-villa essence.

Oddly enough, the stars of the show here are the mature olive trees.

The trees connect the house with the site in a way that is uncommon for these hillside megamansions, which tend to have landscaping as severe as the houses and make everything only be about the view, and they help create a striking contrast between the natural materials of the house and the city grid below.

There simply isn’t enough space here to show pictures to really showcase the full effect and how striking, but subtle this house is in comparison to the typical modern hillside house. But that’s the point of ultra-luxury real estate, isn’t it? It’s all about the experience.

The Calvet Residence

Location: 1061 Loma Vista Dr, Beverly Hills, CA 90210
List Price: $24,950,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1061-Loma-Vista-Dr-Beverly-Hills-CA-90210/20534738_zpid/

This home in Trousdale Estates was designed for the French actress Corinne Calvet by the architect Rex Lotery (who is one of my favorite LA-based architects and one of the Master Architects of Beverly Hills). You might recognize his work from my last Selling Sunset issue- The Mid-Century Modern Moat.

Even just from the street, the house has loads of mid-century charm. You walk through a landscaped garden path, past a pond and planting area that wrap into the footprint of the house, and into an entryway that has floor-to-ceiling windows on both sides- giving you a clear line of sight into the manicured backyard. Inside you’ll find terrazzo floors, wood-paneled walls, and clerestory windows. The house is also dotted with planting areas, skylights, and even a few courtyards which flood the space with light and quite literally bring the outdoors in.

As if this house wasn’t already luxe enough, it recently underwent a renovation and addition that nearly doubled the square footage- adding a primary suite and creating a subterranean level that includes a screening room and wine cellar. You can see photos of the home before renovation here.

The renovation did a nice job of maintaining the original character, but not keeping the place frozen in time. They’ve refined some of the existing details and introduced materials with contemporary glamour that work in harmony with the original spirit of the house. You might not even realize that this is a new addition to the house.

Overall, this house has the kind of relaxed, but luxurious vibe that I think is so quintessentially Beverly Hills. I could easily see this being the kind of place a movie star would buy and give us a home tour of for Architectural Digest, Ruth Asawa sculpture (or knockoff) and all.

The 70’s Semicircular

Location: 1650 Carla Rdg, Beverly Hills, CA 90210
List Price: $11,995,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1650-Carla-Rdg-Beverly-Hills-CA-90210/20534525_zpid/

When I picture LA, this house is exactly what I imagine. It’s a modern-style home with a little bit of 70’s flair and a lot of Hollywood drama. The home was designed by the architect Raul F. Garduno, who designed several homes that have hit the market over the past few years I’ve admired. It is being offered for sale for the first time since its construction in 1971.

The curvilinear home has bends away from the street, wrapping around and concealing a similarly curved pool and verdant garden. You enter the home through a landscaped garden path and step through into a curved hallway that runs the length of the house.

The house takes the 1970’s sunken living room to the next level, demarcating the open spaces with stairs. You can step down into the opulent living room, up into the dining room, stay at the same level to enter the kitchen, or step up into the secondary spaces.

Each space has floor-to-ceiling windows which let in filtered light and feature panoramic views of the city and garden. Some rooms have other flourishes like skylights or an indoor planting area.

The home recently received a light, but glamorous redecoration; most notably swapping out the white carpet for a sumptuous terracotta color. But it’s otherwise true to the home’s original finishes. You can see the before photos here. The reinvigorated space has been operating as a showroom for the design gallery The Future Perfect and a residence for its founder, hence the surprisingly high-design staging.

It’s a stunning reminder of how even subtle changes like updating flooring, painting walls, or putting up wallpaper can bring life into a space and help the architecture live to its full potential. My favorite spot exemplifying this is the primary bathroom. I love the sunken tub in front of the floor-to-ceiling window, and even if the finishes aren’t exactly my taste, you can’t deny the palm leaf wallpaper, goldleaf ceiling, and terracotta carpet take the space from bland box to Hollywood glamor.

And for the love of god please stop making everything white already.

Bonus

• You should have heard the shriek I let out when I realized Heather’s listing was a house I featured in my last Selling Sunset issue. The house sold, but it’s currently available to rent… for $100k a month 💀

I Know a Spot

💵🛍 Selling Sunset

I had never heard of Selling Sunset until my friend (and #1 I Know a Spot supporter) Hareem introduced me to it last week. Since then, I have watched all three seasons and consumed countless memes. While the homes The Oppenheim Group represent aren’t exactly my cup of tea, nothing entertains me quite like the combination of reality television drama and …

Read more

6 years ago · 2 likes · Ariel Norling

• Jason’s house (which we got to enjoy the renovation of and the drama from in season 1) is on the market

• Even the listing describes this as a “Future cover of Dwell Magazine” so you know I’m in

• This home has Architectural Digest home tour vibes at a price point that’s a little more palatable for us mere mortals

• I can’t say I like this house, but it is the most interesting Selling Sunset-vibes house I’ve seen in a long time.

• In case you think the world of Selling Sunset is totally divorced from what’s going on with Russia

I’ve been on my own wellness journey not unlike the one depicted in “Mood Ring”- just with fewer crystals and more at-home medical tests. I ugly cried hearing “Big Star” thinking about the inevitable future when my senior dog passes too. I’ve been going through a mild quarter-life (third-life?) crisis about settling down and growing older like “Stoned at the Nail Salon”. I’ve been doing my best to zen out about my climate anxiety and existential vertigo to “Oceanic Feeling”.

This week I wanted to highlight the homes that have a progressive, sometimes New Age connection to nature and might not be love at first sight.

The Muennig Estate

Location: 50854 Partington Ridge Rd, Big Sur, CA 93920
List Price: $7,995,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/50854-Partington-Ridge-Rd-Big-Sur-CA-93920/19389560_zpid/

There might be no better architect for this issue than Mickey Muennig. Muennig was “the man who built Big Sur” and was behind famous projects including the Post Ranch Inn and the Baths at Esalen. He came to Big Sur in 1971 to attend a workshop at The Esalen Institute and never left. His love for the California terrain and his newly hippie mindset shaped the work he did and drove the organic architecture movement forward.

He created his personal compound on 30 acres of Big Sur’s coast. It’s where he could live, work, and experiment with designs. Muennig started with a glass teepee-like structure that served as a “temporary” home (he ended up spending 18 years living out of it) where he learned from experience about the benefits of passive solar heating and living in less space. The small building has panoramic views of the shore from the ground level and the sleeping loft has unparalleled views of the trees and sky. It’s kind of like living in an Instagram travel porn post all the time.

The glass building ultimately became his studio after he built a larger structure as his residence. The main residence is nestled into the hillside, barely noticeable among the foliage.

The center of the home is circular with curvilinear skylights illuminating an indoor garden. Around the garden are a kitchen, dining room, living area, and workspace with secondary spaces branching off of the sides- including a bedroom nested under skylights and floor-to-ceiling windows. The house is oriented to take advantage of the ocean breeze and views. It’s a dreamy space that feels simultaneously modern and totally organic.

There’s also another home on the property, which Muennig designed in collaboration with his daughter.

The Streng Brothers Home

Location: 4155 Scranton Cir, Carmichael, CA 95608
List Price: $749,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/4155-Scranton-Cir-Carmichael-CA-95608/26028666_zpid/

Sacramento’s answer to Eichler, the Streng Brothers produced almost 4,000 affordable mid-century modern homes in the Sacramento Valley. They were designed in collaboration with the architect Carter Sparks, who had worked for Anshen + Allen- the firm that put Eichler on the map.

Sparks preferred the idea of having an indoor garden- instead of the outdoor atrium typical of Eichler homes- to have an indoor-outdoor feel that would be enjoyable even in the hot Sacramento summers. This home has my favorite example of the indoor garden, with several gardens creating an entryway path into the heart of the house and out to other zones. The skylight also brings loads of light into the center of the home, making it incredibly bright without having walls of endless glass.

The fireplace at the heart of the home with its stacked bricks and cantilevered base anchors the otherwise totally open living space. In fact, I love it so much I wish it was bigger.

The textured concrete walls and indoor gardens create a textural, natural backdrop that adds visual interest next to the sleek modern lines. They add a timeless, almost ancient feeling much like the Mayan ruins. From different sightlines, it’s easy to forget if you’re in the 1950’s, 2020’s, or something much older. Heck, you might not even remember you’re indoors.

The Ward House

Location: 901 Eagle Ridge Dr, Danville, CA 94506
List Price: $4,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/901-Eagle-Ridge-Dr-Danville-CA-94506/18435719_zpid/

I knew I loved this home from the moment I saw the pyramid-shaped skylights and the repeating skewed shapes that create the body of the house. But the connection between the exterior and the unexpected interior of this home are what really make it special.

The pyramid-shaped skylights cap the tall ceilings of the main living spaces, which make the rooms feel even more expansive. They also mimic the shape of the mountain silhouettes in the distance. It gives the house a much grander scale.

Also grand in scale is the stainless steel fireplace floating in the middle of the home and the boulders scattered throughout. There are water features that guide your path through the open spaces inside that flow visually straight into the mirroring water features outside. Boulders are sprinkled throughout the home, defining spaces, softening edges, and even creating furniture.

My favorite space in the home might be the bathrooms though- specifically the bathtubs. The two shown in the listing photos are both positioned in enclaves that take advantage of the view and make the experience of soaking cozier.

The Earthship

Location: 28 Earthship Way, Tres Piedras, NM 87577
List Price: $950,000
Location: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/28-Earthship-Way-Tres-Piedras-NM-87577/2071562956_zpid/

Earthships were conceptualized by Mike Reynolds, a trained architect who didn’t want to create just another house. He said “a house is a piece of shit. I don’t want it to be a house.” He envisioned Earthships as totally off-the-grid residences built into the earth, made of natural and repurposed materials, where residents could harvest and recycle water to grow their own produce. The quintessential design has a long corridor the length of the building with windows and plants on one side and living spaces on the other. I love having to pass through plants to move from space to space in the home.

Even if you’re not trying to grow your own food, there is something romantic about living so close to plants. It makes me feel less apart from nature and makes the winter months not seem so… sad and dead.

I also love how the planters create a sinuous path through the house- ending in a path through the plants into a bathroom that is dotted with stained glass from repurposed glass bottles. It’s a moment of joy in a house dedicated to a serious cause… even if the rest of the layout decisions are A Choice™️.

While I don’t recommend buying an Earthship (or maybe even building one of your own- they have some challenges that can be difficult to overcome), I appreciate the design and material lessons we’ve learned and the legal headway we’ve made from their out-of-the-box thinking in their design and in their quest to be environmentally friendly.

Bonus

I’ve been feeling inspired by this book about buildings that integrate plants into their designs: https://us.gestalten.com/collections/architecture-interior/products/evergreen-architecture

You can learn more about the Streng Brothers here and even purchase some of the original plans here. I also highly recommend checking out the photos of the Streng Brothers homes that Carter Sparks customized for customers here: https://cartersparks.org/

I loved this article in GQ about the communes of Northern California, the structures their residents built, and how they’re starting to disappear: https://www.gq.com/story/californias-vanishing-hippie-utopias

P.S. – August marked the anniversary of the newsletter. When I started it, I could never have imagined that this little newsletter would grow from just a few friends reading about my quirky taste in housing to thousands of subscribers, let alone opening up career possibilities in a new field. I wanted to take a moment to thank you for coming along on this journey with me. I appreciate every message you’ve sent, listings you’ve shared with me, and any time you’ve read or shared an issue.

I also appreciate your patience as I’ve been going through health issues, and I’m grateful for the people who reached out to check on me. I’m trying to find a sustainable cadence for continuing to post, and it might not be weekly for a while.

This week, I’m channeling all of my geology TikTok energy into homes that elicit all of those feelings of solidity and awe.

The Hillman House

Location: 992 Springs Fireplace Rd, East Hampton, NY 11937
List Price: $5,250,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/992-Springs-Fireplace-Rd-East-Hampton-NY-11937/32655675_zpid/

Tucked in a pocket of trees along 4.5 acres of waterfront in East Hampton, the angular Hillman House feels like an outcrop of coastal bedrock. The house was built by Modernist architect Norman Jaffe in 1980. Jaffe was known for his mixture of West Coast romanticism- using sharp lines to create silhouettes that sit nicely on the landscape and focusing on the feeling of the natural materials and light- and East Coast grandeur. This house embodies those qualities perfectly.

Nowhere is this effect more dramatic than the great room, dining room, and kitchen area. Sunlight streams through the center of the home. Light from the patchwork of skylights in the kitchen and skylights along the spine of the house create even more texture and interesting angles.

As grand and dramatic as the skylights are, they create a cozy, human-scale space for a bench that feels essentially outdoors. It’s the morning coffee spot dreams are made of, and there’s already a coffee mug rack waiting for you to take advantage.

Just steps away, the living room has an entirely different feel. It has an almost cave-like feeling with a large stone fireplace and built-in seating nestled into the sunken living area. The corresponding view outside is also low and placid.

My favorite space in the home might be the primary bedroom. The views are obviously the star of the show here, but the room itself has so many interesting things that contribute to the experience of being there: the bed built-in to the low-profile storage drawers, the skylights over the bed, and the large stone fireplace.

The Idyllwild Retreat

Location: 55175 Scenic Dr, Idyllwild, CA 92549
List Price: $1,950,000
Listing:https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/55175-Scenic-Dr-Idyllwild-CA-92549/18048848_zpid/

Nature guides architect Dennis McGuire in making homes. He says his homes are “designed to celebrate the nature of their sites, all designed to play to the Nature on and surrounding their sites.” 

Woven among the trees and perched on top of massive granite boulders, there’s a sense of movement and rootedness inside and out that is unmatched. The home feels a bit like a forest-inspired Frank Lloyd Wright home, playing with light and volume, cantilevering spaces, and creating small pockets of built-in seating at the perimeter.

You can find outcrops of boulder in several of the rooms, really blurring the line between indoors and outdoors.

I love the small touches in this home like all of the built-in bookcases and shelves, and what feels like built-in seating in just about every room.

P.S. If you don’t know who the mayor of Idyllwild is, you should definitely check him out.

The Conlin House

Location: 440 Seven Hills Dr, Boulder, CO 80302
List Price: $2,249,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homes/440-Seven-Hills-Dr-Boulder,-CO,-80302_rb/13196375_zpid/

The Conlin House was built by Charles Haertling in 1967. Haertling was a modernist architect known for his eccentric work, often crafting homes in the shapes unexpected organic forms such as yucca pods or masses of barnacles. His deep appreciation for the Boulder mountains shines through today, even through the modern updates.

Much of the house has a sophisticated treehouse-like vibe with close views of the neighboring pine trees, and playful touches like a spiral staircase at the entryway, a rock climbing wall in the living area, and a lofted area in a bedroom with a swing.

To me, the most impactful room is the kitchen. The round kitchen stands in contrast to most of the sharp angles of the house, and the shape echoes the granite boulders immediately outside of its windows. The drama of the window placement is simply everything.

Breathtaking views can be found at just about every turn in this house, but I found the framing of these windows with the mountain slope to be particularly stunning. Haertling was a master of making his homes feel in tune with their sites.

There’s also an adobe “sunroom” structure on the site that is incredibly charming. Unfortunately for me, it’s not permitted for habitation, so my dreams of renting it out as a studio apartment have been dashed.

The Mid-Century Diamond in the Rough

Location: 5311 E Mitchell Dr, Phoenix, AZ 85018
List Price: $800,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5311-E-Mitchell-Dr-Phoenix-AZ-85018/7566245_zpid/

Hear me out on this one. Sure, there’s not much curb appeal and the photographs are bad and there’s plenty of stuff to be renovated… but this house has great bones.

While the house has some doses of mid-century charm, the real draw is the interior courtyard/living area. It has two(!!) indoor garden areas and what might be the best fireplace I’ve ever seen.

I mean look at it! This fireplace has a gravity to it. The cluster of boulders, sleek modern chimney, and wood paneled backdrop are the perfect mixture of textures and lines.

If only we could see what this house looked like back when it appeared in Sunset Magazine in 1966. I hope the next owners are able to help this home reach its full potential.

Bonus

It feels a little gross to me to speculate about the disappearance of Norman Jaffe, but I found this podcast’s intimate portrait of him and his career to be immensely interesting.

After seeing the covers of Material Transfers and Groundwork, they’re going straight to my reading list.

This paper is made from rocks, and it’s inspiring me to collage: https://rockpaper.store/

When it comes to our homes that’s true too. No one wants to live in a time capsule or furniture showroom. Variety is the spice of life.

Here are my favorite homes that ✨ add a little bit of spice ✨.

The Krauss House

Location: 20 Horseshoe Rd, Old Westbury, NY 11568
List Price: $3,995,000
Location: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/20-Horseshoe-Rd-Old-Westbury-NY-11568/31146885_zpid/

I never would have guessed that a mansion on Long Island would become one of my favorite houses, but this home renovated by famous Modernist architect Ulrich Franzen has captured my heart. Franzen brilliantly integrated parts of the original Jacobean Revival home into the ultra-modern.

The whole home runs a spectrum from modern to traditional. While some spaces are entirely modern, some spaces - like the drawing room- remain frozen in time, and others… well they blur the lines between styles in interesting ways. The grand salon has been reimagined into a postmodern masterpiece replete with wood paneling, plush carpeting, built-in seating, and natural light. A plush conversation-pit-style seating platform forms the heart of the room.

The study on the top floor is one of my favorite blends of modern and traditional. The wood paneling, fireplace, and built-in bookcases keep the space grounded and feeling like a space for serious work, while the windows on all sides and the enormous barrel vault skylight make for a very daydream-worthy space.

One of my favorite all-modern spaces is the primary bedroom. I love the windows and the built-in platform bed. At first, I wasn’t so sure about the raspberry-colored carpet in the main bedroom, but Troye Sivan’s house has convinced me that is in fact ✨ a vibe✨.

The property’s rolling manicured lawns (of which there are plenty since the house sits on about 4 acres), traditional gardens, tennis court, and swimming pool also contribute to the overall vibe of the house. They lend an air of distinctly American old-school glamour and Lana del Rey country club angst that is unmatched.

The Contemporary Cottage

Location: 100 15th Ave, Sea Cliff, NY 11579
List Price: $999,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/100-15th-Ave-Sea-Cliff-NY-11579/31152440_zpid/

This Long Island cottage is being sold as a fixer-upper (“architectural plans already drawn up and village-approved”). While there are some cosmetic things to update and drywall to replace, I love this charming cottage essentially as-is. The entrance to the home is through an idyllic garden area and into the original cottage building.

Inside you’ll find a surprisingly bright and modern space with high ceilings and floor-to-ceiling windows, but the warm wood floors and accents feel true to the original spirit of the house. You also get a preview of the exciting additions that have been made to the home including a breezeway and a glass brick silo that houses the spiral staircase.

I say silo because crossing the breezeway, you enter a modern barn-inspired addition. You’ll find bedrooms inside with exactly the kind of cottage charm you’d expect based on the original house. Vaulted ceilings with exposed beams and skylights make the cozy spaces feel bright and airy.

Just when I thought that this house couldn’t get any better: enter the primary bedroom. It’s this whole lofted space with tons of windows, an oversized fireplace, and a TikTok-approved built-in platform bed. The house expertly uses windows, angled rooflines, and glass blocks to tie both structures together and make the most of the wooded site. It’s amazing how secluded this home feels considering it’s just a couple of blocks away from the village’s downtown area and a few minute walk from the beach.

The home also has a workshop area that currently has a photo studio and sewing setup for that full “I just want to quit my job, move to an old farm upstate, and make things” effect.

The Brooklyn Townhouse

Location: 244 Putnam Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11216
List Price: $3,895,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/244-Putnam-Ave-Brooklyn-NY-11216/30609739_zpid/

This Italianate townhouse in Bed-Stuy is one of the most interesting townhouse renovations I’ve seen. They focused on maintaining and enhancing the existing character more than anything, specifically drawing out the best qualities of the materials. In the front of the house, the original finishes such as the marble surrounds and pine floors have been beautifully restored and complemented with new plaster walls throughout.

A new addition at the back of the house brings a new modern flair to the home.They’ve left the original exterior wall exposed where the two structures meet, and play with that threshold in interesting ways. I particularly love the kitchen’s combination of the original exterior façade’s brick with the new brick and plaster, the existing pine floor with the new ash cabinetry, and the marble countertops that feel both incredibly modern and fit perfectly with the historic nature of the house.

Upstairs in the primary retreat, the original exterior wall creates a sense of definition between the sitting area and the bed area and also creates a threshold between the traditional and the modern.

The modern elements are still kept very simple and material-focused, repeating the same materials, but applying them in new ways.

Bonus

A modern carriage house renovation in Pittsburgh done by underappreciated Brutalist architect Tasso Katselas: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/808-Morewood-Ave-Pittsburgh-PA-15213/11529086_zpid/

An Escher-like SoHo loft: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/118-Wooster-St-4C5C-New-York-NY-10012/2075668877_zpid/

A loft style single-family home in San Francisco with a modern twist: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3132-Laguna-St-San-Francisco-CA-94123/15071128_zpid/

I stumbled across another stunning Ulrich Franzen house on my new favorite blog OfHouses - a collection of Old Forgotten Houses.

The Bronx Tudor Revival from the Work It Out issue is one of my favorite style mashups and it’s still for sale: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/404-W-246th-St-Bronx-NY-10471/29852635_zpid/

Many of these homes were built on modest budgets as vacation houses. The Reese House got its A-frame design in part because they are so cheap to build, but as Alastair Gordon writes in Beach Houses: Andrew Geller: “The strongest influence on the design was the personality of Reese herself, an independent career woman who knew exactly what she wanted – intimate contact with the sea and an instant release from her busy schedule in the city.” That better be my epitaph too.

There’s something universally appealing about A-frames. I thought that it was all about their connotations with vacation, but it might actually be the shape. “Most of [Geller’s] clients live in the cube of a Manhattan apartment, work in the cube of a Manhattan office, and feel liberated in the new definitions of space around them” wrote Fred Smith in Sports Illustrated.

What better time to think about the new definitions of space around us? Here are my favorite A-frames on the market right now.

Bonus: I recommend listening to Teddy Geiger’s remix of “Numb” by Sylvan Esso while you read. The song captures that hopeful, frantic restlessness that A-frames embody. It’s the perfect coming out of quarantine song. Plus, the music video kind of reminds me of Andy Warhol’s Silver Clouds.

The Forest Escape

Location: 2710 Dogwood Ln, Camino, CA 95709
List Price: $649,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homes/2710-Dogwood-Lane,-Camino,-Califoa_rb/18605031_zpid/

About halfway between Sacramento and South Lake Tahoe sits this newly renovated A-frame chalet. From the front, you might not expect much from the suburban-looking exterior. Stepping inside, you’re instantly drawn into the lofty main space. The wooden ceiling and wall of glass emphasize the sense of height.

The house has a modern rustic sensibility, kind of like when Joanna Gaines channels a modern version of her typical style. The home has plenty of clean lines and sharp angles - including a geometric motif - but is also softened and kept in line with the a-frame’s rustic cultural origins with a ton of shiplap. I find the mixture of mid-century, modern, and rustic touches charming, especially in places such as the main bedroom with its tall ceilings emphasized by the vertical wood panelling juxtaposed with the triangular windows.

While the house does a great job of steering away from a lot of the typical A-frame space challenges like short bedroom ceiling heights and awkward angles for main spaces, there are still echoes of the home’s shape throughout. My favorite example is in the main bathroom with its clipped corners and triangular transom.

The Desert Oasis

Location: 15944 Snow Creek Rd, Whitewater, CA 92282
List Price: $849,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/15944-Snow-Creek-Rd-Whitewater-CA-92282/18032887_zpid/

I’ve been dreaming about a desert compound to spend time with my creative friends for a very long time, and I’m not the only one. The current owner, Caroline Lee, also envisioned this mid-century A-frame as exactly that. She bought the home which had been recently renovated from her friend and famous interior designer Sarah Sherman Samuel, who has done stunning renovations for clients such as Mandy Moore and Garance Doré and appeared on the cover of Domino magazine. Caroline did her own renovations and decorating with the help of talented friends, which is very in the spirit of the place.

While this home certainly has the Instagram-worthy rooms to show for it (you should seriously check out the listings to see what I mean), what makes this house the most interesting to me is how it uses the space. I love the gravity of the main seating area at the front of the house, surrounded by windows and grounded by the large stone fireplace. The kitchen is tucked behind the fireplace in a way that maintains the joy from the pop of color in the space and the ease of flow, but doesn’t make dirty dishes a visible distractor. Behind the kitchen is a sleeping loft, where you can safely sleep under the stars thanks to the skylights that run the length of the house and windows to the side.

At first glance, I thought an A-frame house was a strange choice for the desert. But looking out at the mountains from the backyard, it makes perfect sense. The sharp angles feel right at home here. A new saltwater pool and outdoor space also help.

The Multi A-Frame

Location: 2957 Ponderosa Pkwy, Pinetop, AZ 85935
List Price: $694,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2957-Ponderosa-Pkwy-Pinetop-AZ-85935/8412827_zpid/

This unexpected gem is a study in shapes. The structure is essentially two A-frames connected by another A-frame to create an angular H-shaped house. The connecting structure also has sharply angled bump outs and triangular windows. It’s… a lot of triangles.

The effect inside is spectacular. My favorite spot in the house is the living area in the double A-frame. The ceiling height, intersections, and light are spectacular. It feels more like a cathedral than a living room.

There a playful uses of windows and shapes throughout the space. I love the use of the skylights on the sides of the conventional A-frame side of the house that brings in a direct view of the surrounding trees. That kind of vantage point up to small trees is awe inducing. It makes me feel small in a good way.

One of the quintessential features of A-frames that people seem to only love or hate is the loft bedroom. So far the examples in the newsletter havent’ had them, and that might be why they’re so successful because they’ve figured out how to use complicated space in other ways. But to me, there’s something undeniably charming and childlike about sleeping up in a loft. This particular bedroom has the best vantage point nestled into the angles in the wooden ceiling with views to the space below and plenty of light and headroom.

The Rustic Retreat

Location: 333 Phelps Mountain Ln SE, Silverton, OR 97381
List Price: $499,900
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/333-Phelps-Mountain-Ln-SE-Silverton-OR-97381/304064841_zpid/

This charming fixer about an hour south of Portland, OR is the perfect coming home to yourself kind of house. It’s on 20 acres and has the potential to be totally off-the-grid thanks to its solar panels, generator, and well. The house is beautiful as is, but also has plenty opportunity for the right person to come along and bring it to the next level.

Sand blasting the painted ceilings so that they’re wood again, installing new flooring and light fixtures, updating the kitchen, and adding a lot of plants would make this home feel brand new. What I’d do for the opportunity to DIY this house myself.

At just 1,120sq ft, the space feels a lot larger than the footprint implies. The house has lots of light and high ceilings, even in the main bedroom. If I lived here, I’d want to add even more windows to enjoy the view.

The house has the perfect claw-foot tub for enjoying the kind of long baths where you light a few candles, enjoy a glass of wine, read, and escape for a while. It even has a perfectly positioned window to look out at the wilderness and daydream out of.

I am impatiently awaiting retirement to reach my final form: a woman who lives in a house by the shore, spending all of my time taking walks along the beach and writing, and wearing linen and cashmere. Bonus points if it’s the English coast and there are lots of flowers involved. This is precisely where my mind goes when I daydream. My Tiktok feed eggs me on with outfit recommendations for this exact persona. So I figured why not indulge the fantasy a bit more?

These are the ultimate fantasy beach homes on the market right now.

The Crawford House

Location: 266 Bay Walk, Sayville, NY 11782
List Price: $2,100,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/266-Bay-Walk-Sayville-NY-11782/62616725_zpid/

Horace Gifford was an iconic modernist architect who transformed Fire Island into an architectural mecca (in addition to a queer one), producing 63 homes across the island. This home that he designed for (and with) his friend Jay Hyde Crawford is my favorite example of his work. Reading about their collaboration and the owner and the process of building the house, only made me love this home even more.

The home is spread across three main volumes: the living area, main suite, and a guest suite. They are connected via glass bridges that house the dining room and guest bathroom. The home follows a simple logic that ties all of the spaces together: the north- and south-facing walls are glass, the east- and west-facing walls are clad in wood.

The simplicity makes the view the star of the show, but it also leaves room for unexpected touches such as kitchen cabinets that feel like they’re floating and surprise circular features such as the round skylights, closets, and showers. The play with shapes and light bring an energy to the home that keeps it from being a somber wood box, and you can really feel the love and attention to detail that both Gifford and Crawford put into this home.

The house is a quietly luxurious retreat from the rest of the world. The perfect place for relaxing and creating, which makes sense for a talented illustrator and designer’s dream home. When Gifford was asked how he could create this kind of luxury out of a modest budget, he explained “the luxury details are a matter of using standard things in an un-standard way.” If that doesn’t inspire you to try to build your own Crawford house, I don’t know what would.

Thanks to Jenna for sending this listing to me ❤️

The Pebble Beach Shed Style

Location: 3158 Don Ln, Pebble Beach, CA 93953
List Price: $3,695,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3158-Don-Ln-Pebble-Beach-CA-93953/19330417_zpid/

This shed style home captured my imagination for lots of reasons. Obviously, the split volumes caught my eye, but what really brought me in was the location. The densely wooded lot makes the giant home feel like a secluded treehouse with great views of the ocean.

The loftyness of the ceilings echoes the feeling of being up in the trees. The home makes great use out of the high ceilings in various ways, from a loft in the main living space (more treehouse vibes) to skylights and clerestory windows in secondary spaces.

Needless to say, the light in the home is truly spectacular and makes the home feel like it is outdoors. The textured finishes throughout make the home feel very natural and at home in the wooded location.

The relative shortness of the ceilings in the bedroom spaces make the rooms feel sheltered and cozy in comparison. Although they still enjoy the dramatic views of the California coastline.

The Tree House

Location: 529 Sail Walk, Sayville, NY 11782
List Price: $1,750,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/529-Sail-Walk-Sayville-NY-11782/59338884_zpid/

Another Fire Island Gifford home, the tree house is in apt name for this glass and timber pyramid-like home. While there aren’t many photos, the photos that are available tease of a truly remarkable home.

The main living space is on the top floor of the house with gently sloped angles and panoramic views of the lush greenery and sea below. It really feels like you’re removed from the world up there.

Down below where all of the secondary spaces are you’ll find a bit more privacy, and some tasteful renovations and additions, including a heated pool and hot tub for that full retreat vibe.

The Sand Dune House

Location: 116 N Pamet Rd, Truro, MA 02666
List Price: $2,375,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/116-N-Pamet-Rd-Truro-MA-02666/56791849_zpid/

I’m not entirely sure how to categorize this house. While the home embraces both modern and traditional elements, the overall effect feels almost brutalist.

Virtually every surface in this home is clad in wood, making it a warm, neutral texture that fades into the background. Every room has windows that create sight lines to the surrounding landscape with almost surgical precision to showcase a particular hill or dune.

The house seems to both accentuate the surreality of the landscape and provide a soft but strong reprieve from it.

Bonus

The Frank House, designed by Andrew Geller, isn’t on the MLS but it does appear to be for sale: https://www.vpfireislandpines.com/properties/547-beachcomber-2-copy/

In addition to being a notable New York tri-state area beach house architect, Andrew Geller was also influential through his work on a line of inexpensive prefabricated, fully-furnished (down to the toothbrush) houses known as Leisurama which were available for purchase through Macy's department stores. You can watch a documentary about them on Vimeo.

I’ve been enjoying reading about Horace Gifford and Andrew Geller from these books:

• Fire Island Modernist: Horace Gifford and the Architecture of Seduction

• Beach Houses: Andrew Geller

• Andrew Geller: Deconstructed: Artist and Architect - written by Geller’s grandson and Emmy Award–winning documentary filmmaker Jake Gorst.

So we’re looking outside of the box entirely this week and looking at circles, arcs, and triangles.

The Actually Frank-Lloyd-Wright-Inspired

Location: 898 Berkeley St, Boca Raton, FL 33487
List Price: $4,650,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/898-Berkeley-St-Boca-Raton-FL-33487/87664777_zpid/

This circular Boca Raton home is one of the few homes I’ve ever seen that says Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired and can actually mean it. There are elements of a lot of FLW’s famous works mixed together here and it surprisingly works. Most of the influence comes from homes such as the Circular Sun House in Phoenix (which is also currently on the market) and the Ennis House in LA. The combination on this waterside site is surprisingly and delightfully Florida.

My favorite room in the home is the living room. I love the combination of the smooth and patterned “textile” concrete blocks, the large windows, the round fireplace, and the plants draped along the more prominently curved wall. Yes, the only straight wall in this room is the glass wall at the back.

The mixture of concrete and lush foliage with a water view just does something to my soul, and it crystallized for me why it makes sense to have a Mayan Revival home here.

While the circular motif is successful in some places and less so in others (the kitchen island is cute but… a choice), the most successful circle is the primary bedroom. You enter the suite through a curved hallway (much like the Circular Sun House) and are enveloped by the curves of the room. The rounded fireplace makes the room feel intimate and rooted, while the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Gulf Stream help to feel expansive and bright. There’s also plenty of light filtering through the shoji-inspired screens that provide privacy from the main living space.

I could wax poetic about harmony or how circles and the unexpected shapes confuse our expectations just enough to make us happier (you can read about it in Joyful, which I’m reading right now and very much enjoying), but honestly what’s going to make anyone happier than this pool with a view? It’s semicircular, naturally.

The Ed Niles Semicircular

Location: 27929 Winding Way, Malibu, CA 90265
List Price: $13,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/27929-Winding-Way-Malibu-CA-90265/20555832_zpid/

If you’re not familiar with the architect Ed Niles, you should be. The Malibu-based designer’s work is polarizing and equally described as ugly, zany, and futuristic. When Justin Beiber rented Niles’ “Salad Spinner” house, a tweet with a photo of the singer there went viral saying “I have never seen a house uglier.” As my mom would say, there’s an ass for every saddle 🤠

While I probably wouldn’t be rushing to buy an Ed Niles home even if I could afford it, I find his work really exciting. Niles doesn’t even stay within his own box from project to project. It brings me a lot of joy to see something so daring and different, even if this house kind of looks like the Discovery One and the Cleveland airport were smushed together.

The scale of this house is what really makes me excited about it. I wish I could tour this home to feel it because it’s hard to even conceive of in the photos. The public living space is a giant half-circle made out of glass with sweeping views of the wooded land to one side and the Pacific Ocean to the other.

It’s a huge volume that is awe-inspiring and somehow still seems to work on a human scale. The spaces are clearly defined and positioned in a natural way. I love the kitchen and its use of angles and varying heights to create a dynamic space that would be fun to cook and entertain in. I also love the juxtaposition of the round edges, sharp lines, and odd angles. It helps the space feel fun and not rigid or too theme-y.

The (semi) private spaces are connected via a skybridge and have a different feeling from the public spaces. They use the same materials, but the scale and proportion are totally different. The rooms here are much smaller but feel large thanks to the relatively high ceiling heights and use of glass- the lack of divisions between the spaces also helps dramatically. The curved walls and breaks in the mass of the building also define the spaces and make them feel more intimate than their airport hallway aesthetic implies.

This home reimagines what domestic living looks like. This small sample of photos doesn’t do the space justice. I highly recommend checking out all of the photos in the listing.

The Arc

Location: 6645 Northaven Rd, Dallas, TX 75230
List Price: $6,499,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/6645-Northaven-Rd-Dallas-TX-75230/26851514_zpid/

This North Dallas arc-shaped home is the most restrained of the bunch, and I like it because of its restraint. It shows that odd-shaped homes don’t have to feel zany or eccentric. This is a luxury modern home that still takes itself seriously. It reminds me a lot of Davina’s iconic yet-to-be-sold listing from Selling Sunset or a home built by an Apple Store designer. What would have been a boring glass box is made interesting by gently folding around a curved lap pool.

The ground level of the home is kind of like a double shotgun house. It has hallways running the length of both sides of the arc with built-ins and walls set back from the sides to create spaces. It’s clearly not the most private experience, but there is a surprising amount of definition to each space that kind of makes you forget these aren’t rooms.

The Seaside Cabin

Location: 136 Neck Rd, Guilford, CT 06437
List Price: $1,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homes/136-Neck-Rd-Guilford,-CT,-06437_rb/58897042_zpid/

Calling this a seaside cabin feels like an understatement. This triangular home perched on the rocks of coastal Connecticut feels more like a sailboat in a dry dock. The architect Vincent Amore designed the home to be a place for him to be immersed in nature away from his home and work - a place to just think.

The home is less than 1,200 sq ft, but the vast ceilings and large panels of glass all over make the home feel significantly larger. Inside the finishes feel equal parts coastal nature as it does nautical. The warm woods and the stone of the fireplace that spans from floor to ceiling are balanced by the metal, glass, and airy draped fabric sunshades.

Looking out from the kitchen to the water you’d be hard pressed to figure out if your were in a house or on a boat.

Upstairs you’ll find a remarkably lofty bedroom with uninterrupted views of the water.

I can’t imagine a better place to come escape from the world for a while to be with your thoughts, or a more perfect place for the poolside.fm headquarters.

Lee is part of an ongoing pattern of minimizing and erasing the contributions of Asian-American designers. The fact is that many quintessentially American buildings- from the Twin Towers by Minoru Yamasaki to the Googie-style diners of LA by Helen Liu Fong- have been designed by Americans of Asian descent, and a lot of people don’t know it.

This week, I wanted to highlight homes for sale from Asian-American designers, both to bring visibility to them as people and to recognize their contributions pushing the architecture envelope.

The Mid-Century Modern

Location: 2449 Panorama Ter, Los Angeles, CA 90039
List Price: $1,689,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2449-Panorama-Ter-Los-Angeles-CA-90039/20748140_zpid/

Hideo Matsunaga was an architect of Japanese heritage who designed many mid-century modern residences in Southern California. He was also one of the designers for the Japanese American Community and Cultural Center in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo neighborhood.

This stunning mid-century modern home in the hills above Silver Lake was designed by Matsunaga to be his family home. The home has an inviting courtyard entrance that blends the outdoors with the indoors. I love how the board-formed concrete flows between the two spaces and creates a naturally textured surface.

Strangely enough, one of my favorite places in the whole house is the laundry room. The exposed beams and raw concrete finishes give the space a lot of warmth and character. This room would make a lovely woodworking or art studio, or beautiful gym space.

Sadly, Matsunaga died in October after contracting COVID. His family requested donations to their church or the Japanese American National Museum in lieu of flowers or koden. I’ve made a donation to the museum in his honor.

The Sundial House

Location: 7191 Encelia Dr, La Jolla, CA 92037
List Price: $6,900,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/7191-Encelia-Dr-La-Jolla-CA-92037/16851562_zpid/

The Sundial is the personal home of C.W. Kim, a Korean-American architect who designed the Emerald Plaza in downtown San Diego. With strong lines and lots of circular elements, his home is no exception to the bold geometric shapes of his other work. The entrance to this home is over a terraced bridge that arches over a large swimming pool, so naturally, I was in love from the start.

The centerpiece of this home is the barrel-vaulted ceiling with arched beams spanning the wide living space. Much of the living area has generous light from the many skylights and arched floor-to-ceiling windows at both ends which also provide views of the pool and the ocean.

The smaller common areas feel cozy in and sharp in comparison with their angular post-and-beam style, but it’s still complementary to the rest of the house and gives it a dynamic feel.

My favorite detail in the house might be the master bedroom with its sweeping ocean views, built-in circular bed, and a circular alcove ceiling to match. There is something quietly glamorous about this house without keeping things too inside the box.

The Bluff House

Location: 1865 Centro West St, Tiburon, CA 94920
List Price: $13,700,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1865-Centro-West-St-Tiburon-CA-94920/19267747_zpid/

Fu-Tung Cheng is a Berkeley-based designer who quite literally wrote the book on designing with concrete (three, actually). Although he is not trained as an architect, he has grown his career from designing and writing about concrete countertops to establishing a firm where he designs homes (with the consultation of architects and engineers) that feature concrete prominently, often in colorful and sculptural applications. The Bluff House is no exception.

The house itself is beautiful, but its beauty is amplified by the absolutely stunning view of the San Francisco Bay sweeping the length of the house. The polished concrete floors help to bounce around the light from the floor-to-ceiling windows and give it a shimmering quality that mimics the water below.

The house also feels connected to the site in more unexpected ways. In particular, this organic-shaped sculpted porthole in the papaya-colored concrete in the kitchen gives a view of SF that is striking and charming all at once.

I love the echo of the papaya in the high gloss cabinets in the bedrooms downstairs and their juxtaposition with the raw texture and color of the concrete walls. Cheng’s work is a reminder that modern design and concrete can be playful and inviting.

The Desert Minimalist

Location: 3256 E Valley Vista Ln, Paradise Valley, AZ 85253
List Price: $3,390,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3256-E-Valley-Vista-Ln-Paradise-Valley-AZ-85253/71595903_zpid/

This home was designed by Chen + Suchart Studio, a husband and wife studio based in Phoenix which was recently named one of the 15 Young Firms to Watch by Architect Magazine. Thamarit Suchart and Patricia Szu-Ping Chen Suchart met while studying at the Rhode Island School of Design and have run their joint architecture firm for 18 years.

Part of what I love about this house is the unexpected contrast between the green and grey cinder block exterior and the utterly sleek black, white, and wood interior.

The space is not a basic rectangle; there are angles and blocks that create architectural interest without adding visual noise.

In my opinion, the best part of the home is this hulking chevron block of marble that carves out a kitchen area- none of which is connected to the exterior walls. Instead, the kitchen is created out of a series of different pantry-sized cabinets in a mixture of minimalist finishes set at an angle.

Overall, I love the way the architects play with space in the house. This bathroom has its oversized vanity essentially floating in the middle of the room, creating space between the large walk-in shower and the boulder-shaped tub.

This house creates a luxurious minimalist space that is as much of a stunning backdrop as the desert landscape it is incorporated into.

Bonus

One of infamous architect I.M. Pei’s charming townhouses in Philadelphia is on the market and in need of a postmodern makeover: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/247-Saint-Josephs-Way-Philadelphia-PA-19106/10195942_zpid/

This piece about the history of Asian-American architects in Los Angeles is one of the most comprehensive I’ve found: https://ericbrightwell.com/2016/05/10/early-asian-angeleno-architects/

Even when I do have my quarantine daydreams about moving outside of the four walls I’ve spent the past year in, I can only imagine the different shades of Bay-Area-life I could be a living: a houseboat in Sausalito or Mission Bay, a loft in South Beach or Dogpatch, a Victorian in Potrero Hill or North Beach, anything I could get my hands on in or near the Presidio, one of those devastatingly gorgeous homes being built on Yerba Buena Island… not to mention the countless places in the East Bay I’ve fallen in love with.

Just taking a drive down the street or snapping some photos of my walks around the neighborhood on Dispo reminds me of how much I love living here. I could honestly fill several tomes about my love for the Bay Area and the architecture here. But here are several of my favorite listings in the area instead:

The Modern Retreat

Location: 1931 23rd St, San Francisco, CA 94107
List Price: $1,498,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1931-23rd-St-San-Francisco-CA-94107/15152169_zpid/

I am utterly and devastatingly in love with this house. I seriously begged my partner to contact an agent so that we could go view this house (he said no 😢).

From the moment you open the front gate, you’re transported to this place that feels both entirely removed from San Francisco and also entirely San Francisco. This house has a California Modern meets Japanese sensibility with wide-open spaces and natural finishes.

While the house itself is gorgeous, it essentially falls away and becomes a backdrop from the gardens surrounding it. Everything about the main floor of this house is oriented towards the gardens and seamlessly incorporating the indoors with the outdoors. All of the doors on this level (including the front door) are sliding doors that open large swaths of the building to the outdoors. My favorite area is the back corner where the kitchen opens up to the koi pond.

The downstairs (where the bedroom is) is cavernous in comparison and feels a lot more like a typical SF loft space. I love the juxtaposition of the two types of spaces. The downstairs feels like a natural place to retreat to when it’s time to wind down.

The Mid-Century Modern

Location: 1510 Grizzly Peak Blvd, Berkeley, CA 94708
List Price: $689,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1510-Grizzly-Peak-Blvd-Berkeley-CA-94708/24844315_zpid/

From the outside, you probably wouldn’t guess that the plain wooden rectangle would contain so much character inside, although the bridge to the front door is a good hint. The moment you open the front door, you’re greeted by floor-to-ceiling windows across the back of the entire house and a lot of mid-century character. I love the drama of a grand reveal.

While the house does need a lot of work, the bones of this house are so good that it’s easy to imagine the potential. The open living space has so many inspiring features to restore and build upon: the gorgeous built-ins, wood-paneled walls, wood ceiling with exposed beams, and the kitchen island with the floating upper cabinets… there’s so much good here that just needs a little TLC.

The private spaces downstairs are just as charming and enjoyable. There’s nothing like waking up to a view from floor-to-ceiling windows in your bed. I’d never want to leave the covers.

Another thing that I love about this home is how it uses the land it’s on. The garage at the top of the hill has a sizeable workshop in it with windows that look out onto the house and the view. There’s also plenty of space between the workshop and the house (and underneath the bridge! How cool is that to say?!) that could be turned into a lovely patio and garden area.

This unusual mid-century modern home in Berkeley is basically my Bay Area dream: a house up in the hills with good bones, a garden, a workshop, and the opportunity to renovate it over time to a dream house. On second thought, that’s exactly how I would describe the house I live in 🤔

The Contemporary Cottage

Location: 34 Clipper St, San Francisco, CA 94114
List Price: $1,895,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/34-Clipper-St-San-Francisco-CA-94114/15181323_zpid/

This unassuming house in Noe Valley has a charming traditional exterior with a pleasant surprise of an interior. The main living area has tons of light and volume with soaring ceilings and lots of windows (including cute hexagonal windows higher up) and large skylights.

The house has a surprising California seaside cottage feel with its rugged beams, wood-paneled walls, and antique touches like the wood stove in the living room and vintage stove in the kitchen.

My favorite room in the house is the master bedroom. I adore the sleeping platform with the angled roof and skylights right above the bed. I also love how the windows wrap around the bedroom and bathroom area giving panoramic views of the city - especially Mount Sutro.

The Secret Modern

Location: 2454 Bush St, San Francisco, CA 94115
List Price: $2,695,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2454-Bush-St-San-Francisco-CA-94115/15075271_zpid/

Tucked away through a secret entrance off of Bush Street in Lower Pacific Heights, you’ll find two Victorian cottages that have been fused to form a surprisingly modern masterpiece.

The house has a beautiful modern sensibility that still has subtle design touches from its Victorian roots. I particularly love how they used paned doors and paneled cabinet doors in the open living and dining room. They keep the space from feeling flat or sterile without adding too much.

My favorite detail in this house is the floor-to-ceiling window that flows into a skylight that spans the gap between the original two structures and creates the kitchen. I also love how it’s one of the few places where you get a totally minimalist, modern design.

This is all to say that I love this house for all of the romantic things I love about San Francisco: its history, connection to nature, and the constant desire to evolve into something new and different while still being thoroughly SF.

Bonus

A Hansel and Gretel house in Mill Valley: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/347-Melrose-Ave-Mill-Valley-CA-94941/61243300_zpid/

A loft in the Clocktower building: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/461-2nd-St-APT-C135-San-Francisco-CA-94107/15148042_zpid/

A modern houseboat in Sausalito: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/40-W-Pier-Sausalito-CA-94965/2088492051_zpid/

An art deco penthouse on the Embarcadero: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1360-Montgomery-St-San-Francisco-CA-94133/2072903737_zpid/

It made me start wondering what it would be like to live somewhere warm and sunny and close to the water all of the time. Would my life change? Would I become a happier person? Would I feel more energy and workout more? The partially-cloudy skeptic in me says no, but the Island Life I’ve been binging on Discovery+ says otherwise. (Trust me the subscription is worth it for House Hunters: Comedians on Couches alone.) Naturally, I’ve also been thinking about Miami because of how much Mayor Francis Suarez has been campaigning for tech workers from San Francisco to move to Miami. As much as I believe in the Bay Area long-term, The Golden Girls’ house did make me wonder what kind of house you could even get in Miami.

Here are the my favorites on the market in Miami right now.

The Zig-Zag Modern

Location: 10625 SW 89th Ct, Miami, FL 33176
List Price: $949,900
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/10625-SW-89th-Ct-Miami-FL-33176/44283677_zpid/

When I first saw this house, I was intrigued by the angular exterior but wasn’t expecting much. Still, the idea of a brutalist ranch style home interested me. I knew that I was probably in for a treat when I saw that the entranceway to the home is a path over the swimming pool.

But I was still surprised when I saw the interiors. They are not the gloomy, short, cold interiors I was imagining. The house is warm and bright with tall ceilings and lots of light. It feels like a minimalist, tropical version of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House.

The house has a subtle tropical Miami vibe with its lofty wood-clad ceilings, exposed beams, and loads of windows. The windows in this home bring even more personality to the space with smaller clerestory windows in the larger areas and angled ones that mimic the zig-zag of the concrete bricks in the smaller areas.

I can’t imagine a better place to live out my Golden Girls fantasies.

The Tropical Modern

Location: 3571 N Prospect Dr, Miami, FL 33133
List Price: $2,990,000
Listing:https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3571-N-Prospect-Dr-Miami-FL-33133/43863801_zpid/

Honestly, I am a sucker for a house with a courtyard. So this old stone entrance with a lush looking courtyard pulled me right in. And boy what a courtyard it is. The entrance to this house is a tropical-plant-lined path that feels like it could be drawing you to an old world house, except for the stunning turquoise pool at the center of the courtyard.

The interiors of this home were also surprising in that they were neither the old stone or the ultra stark modern that the exterior implies. Inside, you’ll find a contemporary getaway. The home brilliantly pairs white with natural textures throughout. My favorite space is the open living room and dining room space with wood paneled walls and a dramatic, sculptural white staircase.

This home feels like a personal tropical resort, and is exactly the kind of place that I would love to live in to relax, recharge, and bask in how nice it is to be in a place with sun.

The Mediterranean

Location: 675 NE 71st St, Miami, FL 33138
List Price: $650,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/675-NE-71st-St-Miami-FL-33138/43827601_zpid/

I can’t imagine moving to Miami and not living in a Mediterranean or Art Deco place. This particular Mediterranean is basically my ideal Miami home. It has beautiful details including arched openings, wood ceiling, and this stunningly carved stone fireplace.

I also love this retro salmon tile bathroom. If I owned this home, I would love to bring out even more retro character with modern sensibilities.

This home also has amazing outdoor space with a large patio that’s perfect for outdoor entertaining (when it’s safe) and a lush yard filled with tropical plants. In my opinion, the only thing this house is missing is a pool/hot tub combo and some tropical drinks.

The Contemporary

Location: 13500 SW 66th Ave, Pinecrest, FL 33156
List Price: $3,000,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/13500-SW-66th-Ave-Pinecrest-FL-33156/44025876_zpid/

It wouldn’t be an issue about Miami without featuring a Contemporary style home that has some quintessential 80’s Miami flair. This particular home was appealing to me because of the lush grounds, and understated glamour. For a Contemporary mansion, this home has a refined palette and some softer touches that make it feel luxurious even in a modern way.

Unfortunately, the listing only offers a glimpse of the interiors, and many of them are pretty… normal and average. With the right interior design/architect touch, this home could be transformed into someone’s glamorous Miami fantasy.

Needless to say, I didn’t even make it to the end of the video before I opened up Zillow to start looking at homes in the desert. Here are the homes that gave me that coming home to yourself feeling.

The Palm Springs Mid-Century

Location: 67389 E Palm Canyon Dr, Cathedral City, CA 92234
List Price: $1,975,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/67389-E-Palm-Canyon-Dr-Cathedral-City-CA-92234/18135502_zpid/

This home designed by Desert Modernist icon Albert Frey is the perfect time capsule of that time when Palm Springs was becoming a design capital. The current owner has taken great care to restore the home ensuring that all of the building materials are the same as they were when the house was built. While the home feels like a step back in time, it doesn’t feel musty or outdated. It feels thoroughly modern.

What I love most about this home is how connected to the desert it feels. The home is perched up into the hill making it feel much closer to the wilderness than the city. The many windows and large deck provide expansive views of the city below and out to the mountains, giving the home even more sense of separation.

It feels like exactly the kind of place I would run to if I needed to clear my head. I can only imagine what it would be like to live in this kind of home every day. For the full vacation me effect, there’s a pool nestled into the hillside just steps away.

You can learn more about the history of the home here.

The Rustic Ranch

Location: 6424 Pioneertown Rd, Pioneertown, CA 92268
List Price: $880,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/6424-Pioneertown-Rd-Pioneertown-CA-92268/17495735_zpid/

This rustic home in Pioneertown is exactly what I would picture when someone says desert home, and that’s the charm of living in a town that used to be a Western film set. While the exterior is unassuming, the interior is a bright design-focused take on Western style with modern applications of rustic materials.

The focal point of the home is undoubtedly the open-concept kitchen with its rusted metal cabinets that almost look like a dramatic marble mixed with concrete countertops and high shine steel cabinets. The view of the mountains from the clerestory windows provide a picturesque backdrop and make the home feel larger.

The design of this home strikes the right balance between fun energy from the bold mixture of color and finishes in public spaces and tranquility from the muted color palette and rustic finishes in private ones. The high ceilings and loads of natural light in the bedrooms feel like a breath of fresh air.

If that isn’t enough fresh air for you, there is a stock tank pool/hot tub from which you can take in the view of the mountains and the rest of the 10.5 acre property.

The Pueblo Revival

Location: 1103 Canyon Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87501
List Price: $860,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homes/1103-Canyon-Rd-Santa-Fe,-NM,-87501_rb/6832656_zpid/

There is nothing more romantic to me than a Pueblo home with a courtyard and turquoise trim, and this home in Santa Fe is the best one I’ve seen.

From the moment you come in the front door, you’re greeted with old world charm. The main room has two kiva fireplaces tile, and the home has terracotta tile and vigas (wood beams) throughout.

While this home needs some work to bring it to its full potential, I feel really inspired by it. I would love to live here and chip away at the projects slowly over time, learning how to restore some things and how to renovate and draw out character in others.

I would be so inspired here to live out that Southwestern artist fantasy like Agnes Martin or Mary Hunter Austin. I think this room in particular would make a wonderful library and office.

The Reinvented Adobe

Location: 526 S 9th Ave, Tucson, AZ 85701
List Price: $985,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/526-S-9th-Ave-Tucson-AZ-85701/2076776320_zpid/

This house might not look like anything from the street, but it contains treasures inside. The newly constructed home contains the original Adobe structure on this site inside of the house creating a room out of it and integrating bits of the existing Adobe walls into the structure of other rooms. I’ve simply never seen anything like it, and I love the concept so much.

While you can’t appreciate the old structure from the street, I’m happy that they kept the original history of the house. It provides a connection to the place that no new construction could otherwise provide. I also love the warmth and character it brings to the space. Frankly, I wish they had run with the feeling more instead of putting in a bunch of traditional materials throughout the house.

I think there’s so much potential when you strip back the finishes and keep the focus on marrying the best of the old with the new- like the inside of the original Adobe room with the original vigas and the a newly constructed shell that gives the space higher ceilings.

There are flashes where you can see the potential to turn this into an organic modernism oasis. I just hope that potential buyers can see this potential too.

Bonus

A Scandi-meets-Southwest condo: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/810-E-Palace-Ave-APT-C-Santa-Fe-NM-87501/67550419_zpid/

An off-the-grid dome house on acreage in Sedona: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/320-Bear-Mountain-Rd-Sedona-AZ-86336/2078785076_zpid/

A contemporary condo in Palm Springs: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/100-E-Stevens-Rd-UNIT-513-Palm-Springs-CA-92262/63314390_zpid/

Probably my favorite desert house of all time: https://aiasf.org/architecture/design-awards/2020-honorees/high-desert-retreat/

The line “I’d never live in North Carolina, but if I did, I could buy a big, gross mansion” gets me every time.

There are always “why would I live in [desirable location with cute architecture] when I could get [6,000sq ft McMansion with absolutely no character in a remote part of the country] for less?” comments. During COVID times, that’s especially valid. But if I’ve learned anything in bringing you this newsletter over the past 6 months, it’s that people will spend millions anywhere and you can also find cute homes in unexpected places- you just have to hunt for them a little more.

Here are some not-gross homes in cute areas of North Carolina.

The Spanish Revival

Location: 104 Kemp Rd W, Greensboro, NC 27410
List Price: $950,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/104-Kemp-Rd-W-Greensboro-NC-27410/5923449_zpid/

To me, this mansion is anything but gross. The 4,600sq ft property has all of the characteristics I would hope for if I was ever looking to live in a mansion, down to the black stone fireplace and wood detailing throughout. My favorite room in the house is the living room. It’s the kind of airy but semi-formal place the encourages curling up with a good book in a lounge chair by the fireplace or inviting your friends over for martinis and hours of philosophical conversation (even if it’s mostly about the Bachelor or /r/WallStreetBets and when it’s safe, obviously).

Naturally, I also love the library. But I feel like it could be turned to 11 with even more built-in bookshelves and more romantic lighting.

The thing that brings this house over the top for me is the solarium off the living room. With its vaulted ceilings, curved glass, archways with Solomonic columns, and giant Bird of Paradise palms, it feels more like a tropical getaway than a lakeside home in the center of North Carolina. But the steam shower and hot tub overlooking the lake probably don’t hurt that feeling either.

The Shed Style

Location: 602 Windward Dr, Oriental, NC 28571
List Price: $512,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/602-Windward-Dr-Oriental-NC-28571/115924169_zpid/

I find this understated Shed style home to be so endearing. From the boardwalk walkway up from the dock to the wall of windows at the top of the house, I was charmed from the start.

I love the soaring ceilings and the placement of windows around the house. It feels like a Southern take on California cool with a palette of stark white with warm natural materials. I think someone like Leanne Ford (yes, I know I’m obsessed) would be able to style this place into something quietly luxurious and cool.

One of my favorite spots in the house is the master bedroom, which still has the dramatic sloped ceiling clad in warm wood. It also has a skylight over where I might put the bed- although I’d probably want a second one or a much larger skylight to span the width of the bed- and a windowseat.

It wouldn’t be a laid back Southern house without a front porch. This house has two: one on the ground floor level tucked under a bit of the house, and this one off the living room which has been closed in by windows but still has airflow from the giant wall of windows at the front of the house.

This home has the kind of breezy organic modern feel that could entice me to move to North Carolina and live a life more connected to nature, even if that nature is just dipping my feet in the canal.

The Eclectic Home

Location: 1300 Mason Farm Rd, Chapel Hill, NC 27514
List Price: $1,500,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1300-Mason-Farm-Rd-Chapel-Hill-NC-27514/50037930_zpid/

This mansion in Chapel Hill was a pleasant surprise to find, and it’s a great reminder to not judge a book by its cover. While the exterior of the home has some interesting details, it doesn’t convey the beautiful things happening on the inside.

That’s partly because the home has undergone multiple additions and renovations since it was built in 1947. One of the most interesting additions is the great room with its vaulted ceilings, crisscrossed beams, and angular clerestory windows. It is a delightful surprise and the kind of space that just brings reverence.

There are other flavors of modern design in much of the house, including an obvious Prairie School influence. This gorgeous spiral staircase steals the show in many ways, but if you look closely you’ll see a charming writing nook by the large window, complete with a typewriter.

Obviously, I also love the wood paneled library with its built-in bookcases and windowseat, but my favorite detail might be the Prarie style windows.

The Instagram Victorian

Location: 2048 Harrison St, Wilmington, NC 28401
List Price: $1,945,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2048-Harrison-St-Wilmington-NC-28401/54321629_zpid/

This listing is technically for two homes in the Wilmington area (both of which have been beautifully renovated, but for the newsletter I’m only showing photos of the larger house) and all of the furnishings, plus the marketing and management entity for the properties- Dreamers Welcome.

I’ve been following their Instagram for a while and was shocked to see the properties on the market. Every room has multiple perfectly appointed vignettes and each space has its own eclectic- and often postmodern- style.

I love how much of the original Victorian style they’ve retained and made cool through great styling. The huge windows and detailed crown molding and fireplace do make for great bones, but the styling brings what could be an ordinary bedroom to another level. They seem to pull this off in every space, even including hallways.

I also love how they’ve totally transformed many of the spaces. This minimalist, Scandinavian style room stands in sharp contrast to both the ornate Victorian style rooms and the florescent hallway. It brings me so much joy.

If Dreamers Welcome teaches us anything, it’s that anyone with some funds, handy skills, and a vision can transform an ordinary house into a true destination. As if you needed more reasons to moan “I want to flip that.”

Bonus

This house from the Let the Sunshine In issue of the newsletter is still for sale and they recently reduced the price: https://www.zillow.com/homes/853-Buttonwood-Dr-Winston-Salem,-NC,-27104_rb/5786280_zpid/

It would be so much fun to fix up this wild property and make it more residential feeling: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2206-Union-Cross-Rd-Winston-Salem-NC-27107/51624009_zpid/

Bare bones A-frame with a view: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1804-Water-Wheel-Cv-Clyde-NC-28721/65631618_zpid/

Pittsburgh is home to many of my favorite things in the entire world1:

• the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. It’s a gorgeous example of public architecture and the second floor has window seats that look out over the dinosaur room in the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

• my favorite art installation (now defunct ☹️)

• the feeling of release when you go through the Fort Pitt tunnel and pop out on the other side overlooking the three rivers and downtown Pittsburgh. I cried the first time I did the drive. The movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower tried to capture it, but it doesn’t do it justice.

• The Andy Warhol Museum (among many others)

• my favorite pierogi place, and many of my favorite bars and coffee shops

Why Pittsburgh isn’t more highly regarded in the public consciousness, I’ll never know. Home Again With the Fords premiered this week adding even more “pretend you’re Leanne Ford, buy an inexpensive home in Pittsburgh, and renovate it yourself” fuel to the fire. Here are the homes that are making me seriously consider packing it all up and moving back (varying levels of Steve Ford handyman skills required).

The Victorian

Location: 914 Beech Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15233
List Price: $585,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/914-Beech-Ave-Pittsburgh-PA-15233/11376528_zpid/

There are few things quite so quintessentially Pittsburgh as living in a Victorian home on the North Side. This home is a 10-minute walk to Heinz Field and The Mattress Factory and just on the other side of the park from the Allegheny Elks Lodge which hosts the Pittsburgh Banjo Club (just trust me).

This home has been beautifully updated and maintained with a lot of the original details still intact. I love the windows overlooking the tree-lined street.

In a lot of ways the house has been pared back to just the most impactful details, and there’s plenty of room to renovate even more character back into the home. Or if you like the paired back style with a bucket of paint and the right styling you could absolutely have an eclectic Parisian style home.

The Penthouse

Location: 166 N Dithridge St APT 5A, Pittsburgh, PA 15213
List Price: $549,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/166-N-Dithridge-St-APT-5A-Pittsburgh-PA-15213/164333449_zpid/

It might be an unpopular opinion, but North Oakland is my favorite neighborhood in Pittsburgh. It’s sandwiched in between the major universities, very walkable, contains the Carnegie Museum of Art/Museum of Natural History/Library/Music Hall, and abuts Schenley Park. The neighborhood has a wide variety of building types and styles, but the tudor revival buildings are some of my favorite and Hampton Hall is no exception.

This penthouse unit is a charming surprise. It’s a two-story unit with heigh ceilings and lots of graceful curves, plus a lot of square footage.

My favorite area in the space is the living room/library. I love the arched doorways, wood beams, and detailing around the fireplace and built-ins.

I also love the angled ceilings in a lot of the secondary spaces, especially this mint tiled bathroom.

The Contemporary

Location: 1073 Dorset Rd, Pittsburgh, PA 15213
List Price: $1,995,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1073-Dorset-Rd-Pittsburgh-PA-15213/11529501_zpid/

Pittsburgh is not all old houses, and this contemporary mansion on the edge of CMU’s campus is a great example of that.

This home enjoys views of its lush surroundings from floor-to-ceiling windows on every level (including the indoor pool on the ground floor). I particularly love the main living space with its wood paneled walls and ceilings, and angled windows that give the room more interest than just being a flat box.

I also love the built-ins that make space for the entertainment system and separate out the spaces in the open floor plan.

This home also has one of my favorite features: an atrium. I can’t imagine anything nicer on a cold winter day than spending time in the atrium amongst the tropical and desert plants. It’s like a personal Phipps Conservatory.

The Fixer Upper

Location: 2438 Saunders Station Rd, Monroeville, PA 15146
List Price: $330,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2438-Saunders-Station-Rd-Monroeville-PA-15146/11652105_zpid/

My heart skipped a beat when I found this listing. If you look past the grainy photos and the dark lighting, there is a gorgeous diamond in the rough here waiting to be polished. This mid-century modern home has all of the character you’d expect and then some, including an indoor pool at the heart of the house.

Yes, this home is going to need quite a bit of work but it would be so worth it.

Bonus

Pittsburgh is really into renovating old churches and turning them into a new use. This unit is a blank slate and it would be cool to put your special touch on it: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1-Pius-St-SUITE-B7-Pittsburgh-PA-15203/2075649562_zpid/ or you could just buy a whole church and figure out what to do with it: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2235-Federal-Street-Ext-Pittsburgh-PA-15214/2111299673_zpid/

I’ve dreamed of moving into this building since I was a student at CMU. This unit is cute, but I’m holding out hope of one day getting a rare two-story unit: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/540-N-Neville-St-APT-805-Pittsburgh-PA-15213/11529061_zpid/

The closest to a Leanne Ford farmhouse I could find: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3617-N-Hills-Rd-Murrysville-PA-15668/10684503_zpid/

One of the biggest things keeping me Pandemic Fine™️ is the state of the spaces in my house. So much of the house has been in limbo while we’ve been planning for renovations. We haven’t invested in making things better in the meantime… and that’s how I’ve been treating a lot of my life. So I’m working on making space both literally and figuratively for the things that are going to inject more joy and relaxation and creativity into my life.

Here are some of the homes for sale this week that have elicited similar feelings in me.

The Spanish Eclectic Estate

Location: 22 Roble Rd, Berkeley, CA 94705
List Price: $12,000,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/22-Roble-Rd-Berkeley-CA-94705/251192295_zpid/?altId=956001_40934311

If I close my eyes and imagine the kind of retreat that a badass female artist or writer would live in, the McDuffie Estate is precisely what I see. It is an idyllic escape on almost an acre tucked away on a quiet street in Berkeley.

After falling into disrepair, this 1920s home was beautifully restored and renovated by Fisher Architecture about 10 years ago and given new life. You can read more about the renovation here. It’s easy to see why the current owners saw so much potential in the home. It has so many entrancing details. The most captivating place in the home has to be the living room with its high, patterned ceiling, elegantly carved details, built-in bookcases, and huge arched french doors that open to the garden.

I also love the dining room with its warm terracotta hue, dramatic arched ceiling, french doors, and beautifully maintained fireplace. This home has a wonderful mixture of old and new that draws out so much of the romance of the original details of the home while bringing a better balance to the secondary spaces. It has a timeless elegance with the modern additions rooted in the history of the home.

Even the grounds of this property are just as grand and transportive. It’s difficult to look out at the garden and remember: “ah yes, this is Berkeley.” You might just look up from your leisurely swim in the pool and think that you were in Seville.

The Georgian Manor

Location: 71 Old Tappan Rd, Locust Valley, NY 11560
List Price: $3,850,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/71-Old-Tappan-Rd-Locust-Valley-NY-11560/31168278_zpid/

There’s something very Great Gatbsy about moving to Long Island to find a sense of freedom and identity while living in an ivy-covered brick manor house, but I love it.

This updated Georgian is the perfect Light Academia home. It has tons of light pouring in that makes the home feel cheery instead of stuffy, and it highlights the delicate details throughout.

The mixture of traditional and modern touches throughout makes the home feel quite dynamic to me. There are spaces that feel entirely modern or traditional and some that are blended together in interesting ways.

I love the living room with its dark wood paneling that is balanced by a round breakfast nook with oversized windows. It creates an atmosphere that would be just as inviting on a cold winter evening as on a warm summer day.

Overall it’s easy to imagine living a peaceful, contemplative life here filled with lots of reading and leisure, especially since the grounds of this 5-acre property also include a garden, pool, and tennis court.

The Contemporary Mansion

Location: 38 Mallard Lake Rd, Pound Ridge, NY 10576
List Price: $4,850,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/38-Mallard-Lake-Rd-Pound-Ridge-NY-10576/33083161_zpid/

It’s easy to feel inspired with a home that is full of art and light, but this spacious contemporary home in upstate New York takes this to another level.

This house plays with volume and windows and shapes unlike just about any other house I’ve seen. There are very few rooms in the house that are just a rectangle. I find the secondary spaces in this house to be the most interesting and inspiring. This bedroom with the library wall and the recessed area for the bed might be my dream bedroom. I love that the bed is enveloped in windows but still private.

I’m especially enamored with the arched spaces in the home including this private library/office space and its voluminous mezzanine level counterpart, not to mention the indoor swimming pool!!

The Victorian House

Location: 18 Parnassus Ave, San Francisco, CA 94117
List Price: $1,995,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/18-Parnassus-Ave-San-Francisco-CA-94117/15087893_zpid/

Nothing washes away the dreariness of foggy San Francisco days like a pastel yellow Victorian. This nicely maintained home in the heart of Cole Valley has all of the charming details you’d expect from a Victorian.

I especially love the window seat overlooking the street from the master bedroom.

But what I really love about this home are the bits of unexpected color. While most of the home has been painted white inside, the kitchen is a bright shade of Frida Kahlo blue. I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but Victorian interiors weren’t white! And this bold shade of blue in a modern choice that brings back some personality.

Downstairs you’ll find a much warmer vibe, with wood ceilings and this cute little office nook with loads of natural light from a hodgepodge of different window styles including some stained glass. It almost feels like you’re sitting in the garden while you’re working.

Bonus

Some other beautiful homes with inspiring workspaces:

• https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2540-Grosse-Ave-Santa-Rosa-CA-95404/15869370_zpid/

• https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/6380-N-Highway-1-Little-River-CA-95456/2084352341_zpid/

For tips on how to make your home happier, I recommend reading this recent article from Quartz: https://qz.com/1959344/how-to-make-a-happy-home-according-to-science/

For me, DC is more than a political center. It’s where I lived for part of 2010, where I met some of my closest friends, where I made some of my core memories, and where I became who I am today. I went to DC to intern for a Congressman at the Capitol, and somewhere between the policy memos and solo trips to the National Building Museum, I left convinced that I wanted to do something more creative with my life. Sometimes I forget that I was ever that person.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to be more like DC: rooted in history and still finding ways to grow and change while holding onto it. We’re still learning how to hold onto the incongruous parts and the parts that would be more convenient to forget.

Here are my favorite homes in DC that represent the old and the new.

The Logan Circle Carriage House

Location: 1314 Vermont Ave NW #CH6, Washington, DC 20005
List Price: $749,995
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1314-Vermont-Ave-NW-CH6-Washington-DC-20005/2078573725_zpid/

This newly renovated carriage house just steps away from Logan Circle is a beautiful blend of old and new tucked into just under 1,000sq ft.

The main draw is the open floor plan living space on the second floor, which has tons of natural light and character.

Although the space is open, there is still movement and personality to it because of the sloped wood beamed ceiling and large windows set at a dramatic angle.

Downstairs you’ll find a generously sized bedroom and bathroom with ample storage and little decor details that nod to the traditional character of the house while keeping things sleek and contemporary.

To me, this is the perfect home for someone who wants something with ✨loft vibes✨ without having to compromise on privacy or storage space.

The French Norman

Location: 3001 Foxhall Rd NW, Washington, DC 20016
List Price: $2,295,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3001-Foxhall-Rd-NW-Washington-DC-20016/442296_zpid/

This Normandy-inspired home sits on a beautifully landscaped third of an acre on the Northwest side of town. Inside the home, you’ll find loads of elegant details including curved staircases, ceiling ornaments, and wooden beams.

What draws me to this home in particular though is how the secondary spaces are treated. You’ll still find charming details and layouts in the bedroom spaces that give them a sense of both coziness and elegance.

My favorite spot in the whole house has to be this room on the lower level with a sculptural curved wall clad in wood paneling. It would make a beautiful backdrop to a home office or a stylish lounge area.

The Adams Morgan Carriage House

Location: 2007 Wyoming Ave NW #17, Washington, DC 20009
List Price: $609,900
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2007-Wyoming-Ave-NW-17-Washington-DC-20009/311111598_zpid/

At just 600 sq ft, this renovated carriage house in Adams Morgan is the smallest property I’ve featured in this newsletter. While small on space, this unit is big on style and uses its small footprint well.

The most defining feature of the space is the Gambrel roof. The unit occupies the top floor of the building and uses makes the most out of the angles of the roofline.

Every nook in the space is utilized to the fullest, creating stylish storage spaces or inviting more light in through dormer windows.

In addition to adding style to the space, the moldings on the walls and the herringbone pattern flooring help the space to feel larger and give a nod to the history of the home.

The Contemporary Cabin

Location: 5198 27th St NW, Washington, DC 20008
List Price: $1,995,000
Listing: https://www.zillow.com/homes/5198-27th-St-NW-Washington,-DC,-20008_rb/458363_zpid/

When you think Washington DC, you probably don’t think contemporary or cabin, but this wood-clad home overlooking Rock Creek Park in Northwest DC feels like it would be at home in The Sea Ranch.

Inside the home, you’ll find clean lines and an abundance of windows and skylights that keep the attention on the outdoors instead of the inside.

The house plays with volume and sightlines in ways that keep the floorplan open but gives each space its own personality and helps to break up the massive mutli-level 5,200 sq ft into human-sized vignettes.

The biggest draw for this property though has to be the outdoor space with many patios and a direct view of the park across the street. The only thing missing from this property might be a hot tub, which would fully flesh out its nature retreat feel. But it does already have a sauna, so that’s a great start.