Happy Friday Everyone!

About the clients:

This week’s clients, a Senior Vice President of a Dot.com company and his wife, bought a brand home in Southern California. When our clients purchased their home, they took advantage of every luxury upgrade available to them through the builder. Once complete with all the upgrades, new furniture selections, art and accessories, they felt their own efforts to create their dream home lacked the polish they were looking for. Robeson Design to the rescue! The project was divided into phases and spanned several years but for todays Fix It Friday lets start with the all-important Entry Way. It is, of course, the first impression to every home!

What they wanted:

A WOW! That’s right, they wanted to feel the excitement of walking into their home and getting that WOW factor. Large amounts of money had already been invested but so far, no WOW! They wanted their design team to take them to the next level.

Challenges:

The space was a nice round shape with art niches, a circular staircase with a Juliette balcony at the top, one in the middle and entries to both the living room and hallway/dining room. Lots of things were going on in the space but there was no continuity. The gorgeous flooring was laid out in a diamond shape grid pattern of Sapele wood separated by natural stone from Walker Zanger.
The upgrade of wood treads on the stairs with wrought iron railing was disappointing and lacked the custom look and feel they desired.
The coffered ceiling was impressive at first glance but closer inspection revealed it was built with cabinet door faces and not an authentic coffered ceiling at all.
What made all of this challenging was, they had just paid for all of these upgrades and to do it all again, correctly, was going to cost more. A LOT more.

Changes I Made:

My wood-working craftsmen removed the “cheater version” of the ceiling and built an authentic legitimate coffered ceiling out of solid walnut with a clear stain finish.
The stairs were rebuilt with a skirt of drywall sweeping down the side, eliminating the view of each individual step from below. I designed custom hand forged iron railing to replace all readymade iron work and a hand carved hand railing in solid walnut was added. Solid walnut wainscot was added to the staircase and rounded walls on the ground floor.
Rich wood columns lined the opening to the living room and upstairs hallway entrance.
The art niches were paneled and mirror was placed on the sides of the walls to better reflect the art pieces in the niches.
Light sconces were appropriately placed along the staircase as well as art niches and the wooden stairs were replaced with solid stone slabs on both the stair treads and risers.
We installed four new sconces on either side of the art niches as well as tiny art lights inside the niches.
The staircase boasted two beautiful sconces with circular lines consistent with the overall design esthetic of the space.
New stair lights embedded in the wainscot lead the eye upward toward the alabaster chandelier the clients had already purchased lighting up the beautiful new coffered ceiling.
We chose to keep the space completely open. No furniture was used.
Well appointed sculptural art pieces were selected to keep the design esthetic minimal and spectacular. Our emphasis was placed on the beautiful natural materials of the Sapele wood, natural honed stone, walnut wood grain and rich hand-forged iron work.

Designer’s Secret:

Once discovered here was a vast amount of space under the staircase the clients requested access to use the space for storage. I designed a hidden room accessible through a recessed bookcase under the stairs. Complete with lighting and accessories, it was a nice little bonus for our clients in the end! I think its safe to say, Once we completed and installed the project…our clients got the WOW Factor they were looking for!