Short-Order Remodel
“I love light and space,” says chef-restaurateur Hans Rockenwagner, “but this house had neither.” So he decided to remodel and expand the tiny Venice bungalow he bought for his fiancee, public relations executive Patti Shin, and his three young children, Gina, Roxy and Hansi. To tackle the job, he sought out two Santa Monica architects whose projects he admired, Regina Pizzinini and her partner, Leon Luxemburg.
Working within a modest budget and restrictive zoning regulations, the architects and their project manager, Tryggvi Thorsteinsson, skillfully wove together old and new. From the street, nothing about the house appears to have changed. A step inside reveals that the interiors have been gutted, leaving intact the front and side walls and a free-standing red-brick chimney with odd fragments of plaster and floral wallpaper still attached. New children’s rooms flank the entry, and an open kitchen serves the dining area. The original, low-ceilinged space segues into the new living area and adjoining master bedroom under a soaring, open-joist ceiling. Natural light floods through picture windows, clerestory openings and skylights. Glass doors swing open to a glass-canopied wood deck, a grassy yard and the existing pool.
Color is used with restraint. Pizzinini and Luxemburg launched their practice eight years ago, building a guest house in Santa Monica for film producers Roger and Julie Corman and painting it sizzling red, yellow and blue. Recently, they enlivened two condo blocks, on 2nd Street and California Avenue in Santa Monica, with the same bold hues. Rockenwagner, who specified white and soft yellow for the interior walls, allowed the architects to add a splash of vivid yellow in back and bright red on a projecting bay lined in intense orange. To cut costs and speed completion, he drew on his own skills as a carpenter, building the kitchen and bedroom cabinets from stained Finnish plywood. He also installed a Viking stove and a Subzero refrigerator so he could perform the same culinary magic at home that he practices most nights at his eponymous restaurant.
Barely four months of construction transformed the cramped cottage into an open, airy loft-like space now filled with whimsical painted furniture, vintage posters and works by Los Angeles artists Laddie John Dill, Peter Alexander and Bill Barminski. Above all, the owners have all the space they wanted. “Lying in bed, you have an all-around view and can watch the planes flying into LAX or the course of the moon,” Rockenwagner says. “It’s like living in a lighthouse.”
