A Towering Feat
An accomplished Hollywood music attorney, Martin Cohen can be found most days pushing a wheelbarrow across his two lush acres in the Hollywood Hills, using his jackhammer (the rented ones were costing him “a fortune”), sawing tiles in a converted gardening shed or choosing plants at the nursery.
“I’ve paid my dues. I can do what I want with my time,” said Cohen, 70, who has cut his lawyering back to two days a week.
For the last 38 years, Cohen has poured much of his free time and energy into his home, which he has transformed from “a junko Colonial” he bought for $40,000 to the striking Mediterranean villa it is today. “Everything you see, I’ve done,” he said.
The latest major project, completed earlier this year by a general contractor, was the addition of a two-story Tuscan tower with a blue tile roof, arched windows and a tiled fountain.
The tower “is our greatest accomplishment,” said Cohen’s wife, Trish. “My husband did all the stonework and mosaics.”
Martin Cohen bought the property in 1964 with an $8,000 down payment that he borrowed from a friend. Once part of a larger estate, the sloping two acres were mostly covered with 40 avocado trees, Scottish broom and what he called “rat-catching ivy.”
Among Martin’s first projects was a swimming pool, right outside his bedroom, which he said he uses “religiously” every day. Later, he built an adjacent hot tub in a gazebo decorated with tiles and antique glass.
To create a back patio, he built a retaining wall to hold back the sloping ground and terraced the remaining land with flower and vegetable beds, fruit trees, pathways and poultry yards. He used to raise goats, and he still raises chickens, geese and turkeys for the legendary feasts he and Trish prepare for friends.
Over the years he has installed a walk-in freezer, a wood-burning pizza oven and a series of wine cellars into the retaining wall. All told, the property holds 9,000 bottles of wine. “I thought it was 11,000,” Trish said.
“I’m cutting down,” Martin said. “I’m beginning to believe I can’t drink it all.”
Inside, the house has evolved from a three-bedroom family home, where Martin raised his two children, to a two-bedroom, five-bathroom entertainers’ delight. Martin dug out a basement wine cellar years ago and festooned the walls with hand-cut tiles shaped like grape vines. These days, all the parties end up down there. Said Trish: “It’s packed.”
Trish came on the scene 15 years ago and encouraged Martin to move the decorating scheme away from the dark Mexican style he had created, influenced by frequent trips to Tijuana, and toward a lighter Mediterranean flavor.
When she arrived, Trish said, “the house wasn’t as pretty as it is now.”
The quality and scope of the home’s remodeling projects increased dramatically in 1998 when the couple met general contractor Norman Knoff. The first project was removing 37 tons of hillside to build a garage for Martin’s pristine 1952 Rolls Royce.
Right away, Knoff noticed the home’s ragtag kitchen, barely more than a kitchenette, where Trish had cooked for as many as 150 guests. She was used to making do, having grown up one of nine children in a two-bedroom cottage in Ireland.
“It was the biggest mishmash I’ve ever seen,” Knoff said of the kitchen. But it did contain a giant Wolf stove, which Trish said attracted her when she first met Martin.
In 1999, Trish and Knoff persuaded Martin to convert the home’s attached garage into a full-sized kitchen--but it wasn’t easy.
“He hit the roof,” Knoff said. He recalled Martin saying: “She’s not going to make me move my tools, is she?”
Looking into the packed garage, Knoff retorted: “How long has it been since you’ve used your fishing poles? Twenty-five years?”
Eventually, Martin relented. “Martin’s very old-fashioned,” Trish said. “It’s hard to move him.”
She credits having the contractor as an ally for making the kitchen and an attached pantry into a reality. “Norman saved my life,” she said.
As the kitchen neared completion, Martin added his touch by covering a large arch with stone, and installing tiles from Ann Sacks onto the edge of the stove hood. He also retained the $28 wrought iron pan rack he bought years ago in Tijuana.
The $73,000 tower came about when Trish requested “a real clothes closet” in the master bedroom. Martin was happy with the narrow, low-ceilinged corridor he created in an attic space. But it was too claustrophobic for Trish, who told Martin his next wife should be no taller than 5-foot-2. But, Martin said, Trish is “a keeper.”
At first, the couple wanted to build a second story over the bedroom, but as Knoff explained the process, they realized it would be too disruptive for them and their menagerie of cats and dogs. Plus, Thousand Oaks designer Doris Anne Mendenhall pointed out, a second-story closet and the existing first-floor bathroom would make for a clumsy arrangement.
The idea for the tower, to be attached adjacent to the bedroom at the end of the house, was conceived of and sketched out by Mendenhall. It called for a blue tile roof to match that on the existing house, a faux door that evokes a castle and an ornate fountain.
Inside, the ground floor of the tower would serve as Trish’s cedar-lined closet and the second floor, accessed by a spiral staircase and open to the bedroom, would be an exercise room.
Constructing the tower with its massive exposed ceiling beams and rafter was a dramatic event. An early idea was to drop the entire roof unit from a helicopter, but ultimately the 600-pound beams were hauled in through the windows.
“Five guys,” Martin said. “All brute force.”
The roof tiles alone required three weeks to cut and install. With construction done, Trish called in Closet Factory to equip the circular space with a sophisticated blend of mirrors, shelves, cabinets, shoe racks, glass-fronted drawers and rods for hanging garments.
“See what I paid $80,000 for?” Martin asked a visitor. Said Trish: “I think that’s cheap. Don’t you?”
Now that the tower is done, Trish worried briefly that Martin--whom she refers to as Paddy O’Cohen when he passes with his wheelbarrow--will have nothing to do.
“Don’t worry,” Knoff said. “There’s a list.”
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Kathy Price-Robinson is a freelance writer who has written about remodeling for 11 years. If you have a question for the homeowner about this remodel, visit www.kathyprice. com.
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Source Book
Project: Add two-story Tuscan tower onto Hollywood Hills home
Designer: Doris Anne Mendenhall, Thousand Oaks, (805) 373-0346
Contractor: Norm Knoff, general contractor, Van Nuys, (818) 902-0161, e-mail: Normlex@netzero.net.
Cost: About $73,000
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Where the Money for Remodeling Went
Project: Tower addition
Supervision ... $8,800
Plans ... 2,100
Permits ...750
Demolition ...1,800
Foundation labor
and materials ...3,350
Scaffolding ...350
Framing lumber ...2,900
Exposed beams
and rafter ...1,200
Labor framing, install roof
and ceiling ...4,800
Insulation ...1,800
Drywall ...3,600
Roofing materials ...650
Blue roof tiles ...6,600
Labor for roof tiles ...6,200
Arched windows and doors
built and installed ...3,300
Window glass ...550
Stained glass ...700
Electrical ...2,800
Stucco ...3,200
Plumbing ...2,100
Painting and
wood finishing ...1,100
Stonework ...2,100
Hinges and hardware ...430
Cedar for closet ...1,050
Closet installed by
Closet Factory ...5,140
Tile for floor
and fountain ...1,025
Indoor oak balcony ...750
Spiral staircase
installed ...1,450
Mirror wall ...750
Trash hauling ...1,250
Fountain ...300
Total ...$72,895
