In The Colony, a gated enclave of the Hollywood Hills where midcentury homes survive in unusual numbers, a 1960 residence by Whitney R. Smith carries the quiet authority of a building that knew exactly what it wanted to be. Smith, a Case Study House architect and co-founder of Smith & Williams, belonged to the generation of Southern California modernists who treated sawn ceilings and angular geometries as instruments for light, drawing it down into volumes at measured intervals. The brief was delivered to Uncle Dezin it was less a renovation than a negotiation with that intelligence.
The studio recognized early on that architecture would lead and that real discipline was in limitation. Renovations during the 1980s and 1990s had blurred the original logic of the house, and the project became as much a subtraction as an addition. This required improving proportions, reclaiming flow and resisting the temptation to over-design a house. The custom spiral staircase, ceiling heights and structural rhythm were retained rather than reinterpreted.
A warm, earthy palette of rich woods, plaster and tonal stone offsets the sculptural drama of the architecture. The staircase, its curve resolved into a bold red bottom, becomes the highlight of the room, a graphic gesture placed on otherwise calm surfaces. An oversized revolving door opens into a double-height foyer, where gallery proportions and a sawn ceiling offer a purposeful flood of daylight.
Ome Dezin looked towards Milan, and towards Villa Necchi Campiglio Specifically, Piero Portaluppi’s 1930 villa with lacquered surfaces, controlled luxury and rooms that keep their composure under pressure. This sensibility comes through in the color combinations and low, structured furniture that comes from Dusty Deco, Made by choice, NO G.A.and Hello.
A shared bathroom in the second wing is fully committed to a lemonade yellow, its copper accents and glass brick that read as midcentury optimism of the era rather than pastiche. The master suite, set under original high ceilings with a light loft, changes color with a minimalist cool, while its bathroom frames a clear view of the hills above the vanity. Graphic works by Creative Art Associates note the calm at intervals.
To learn more about the studio behind the design, visit omedezin.com.
Photo by Patrick Beeler with styling by Lisa Rowe.
