IMO you need to decide which style you want so that when we answer you are actully gwtting real help. I wouldnever do spanish so if MCM is your aim then tell me what the budget is and I can help.IMO just getting rid of all the arches will be ahuge improvement , no to painting the brick but I also find there is too much brick for MCM. Landscaping is chosen for where you live so maybe share that info. I do not see ground cover so assume you are in a place where the plants die back in the winter.

Hi Patricia - thanks for your response. I think you’ve hit the nail on the head - we don’t know what direction to go with the design of our exterior which is why we are asking the Houzz community for guidance. If you wouldn’t do Spanish revival and if there’s too much brick for MCM, what would you do? Our budget is about $15k. We aren’t really focused on landscaping at the moment and just included that tag in the hopes that we might get more ideas. Thanks!

If I bought this house I would paint the stucco a dark dull but deep earthy or wine red and replace the garage door with wood, but match the color of wood to the existing door, not the other way around. Then I would live with that for a while until I figured out everything else I wanted to do.

I would take away the brick mailbox unit, or take off the brick top of it.

Before I did anything I would use one of those apps where you can use a photo of your house to experiment with different colors, but this (or even a bit darker) is the color I’m thinking I’d try first

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32. Small 1950s Eichler Expansion · More Info

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The red of this trim

This house would have been avant garde in 1966 - many houses in this style were built in the 1970's. It'd be worth checking to see who the architect was on the plans at city hall. In the meantime, ask yourselves what you like about the house exterior and what you do not like. Make two lists.

It is not going to look Mediterranean no matter what.

Your best bet is emphasizing its own true style. New windows and new paint for the trim and window areas would be excellent updates.

If you don't like the contrast, pick a color that goes with the stone.

The house is great, embrace

This is going to be a very nice house, but it doesn't have the bones to be any kind of Spanish revival IMO. The arches, metal fencing, etc. are very superficial details. If it were me, I'd do my best to get rid of, or tone down the arches; I'd remove the fence and do something fresher, e.g. in the examples someone has posted above and below. And, yikes, not the craftsman!

If you like the renderings from @Celery. then get photos of mid-century houses and see how much of this house you want to change and what you want to keep. If you embrace the current look, then the front door seems very Craftsman and out of place. Or at least paint it a contrasting color. The black iron may be throwing you off, but it isn’t just for Spanish style homes.
You house is very unique. If you want to get rid of the brick look, that can be done. Or, you can work with it. Do NOTHING until you have a plan. That budget can fly out of your hands quickly, so go slow.

Parkford House · More Info

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Search HOUZZ: Ideas>Exterior>Mid-century modern>2-story. There are many many examples.

Agree with everyone that Spanish is not in the offing.

While I mostly think this is a really wonderful modern house, the arches are rather odd and the bricks don’t look as fresh as I bet they once did. I think it could be a good idea to stain the bricks a dark neutral color (eg gray?) and paint the arch-less stucco a sharp white, then replace the front door with something bold and colorful. Some slightly similar pictures here.

I think your house is already very unique and stylish, and is about to truly stand out!!

Not a designer, just sharing that the iron work makes the front appear unwelcoming to me, almost fortress-like. Imagine it without that, and without the columns in front of the patio. Then the house looks more approachable and friendly. I’ll be interested to see the progress!

What really makes this style of MCM house stunning are floor to ceiling windows. I’d use the majority of that budget to rework the front three panels into two (or 3, depending on the rooms) huge window sections. The windows should go all the way up to the roof and be angled at the roofline. On the inside, install remote control blinds that nearly disappear when pulled up to the horizontal line. Leave the top triangle windows uncovered. Eliminate the arch in the stucco over the garage and remove the iron gate. Paint the front door and sidelights for now but look for a MCM double door. Replace lights with simple MCM style. If you have room in the budget, paint the brick, replace the garage door and mailbox.

Everybody slapping up photos of MCM houses is getting funny. It reminds me of that old New Yorker cartoon of an executive sitting in his MCM office, talking into his desk intercom to his secretary, pleading: “Could you please bring something round in here?”

At some point somebody who owned this house wanted some curves. If you paint out the curves with dark-toned paint and get rid of the beehive mailbox and the round doo-dad over the garage, it will solve 90% of your problems, and you can focus on getting the curves out of the landscaping and hard scape.

With a couple of hundred thousand $$$$$ you can use this house to approximate the look of a MCM masterpiece — but as noted, brick really isn’t an MCM material, so you might not end up with a very impressive result.

With 15 thousand $$ you can use paint and landscaping to reinforce the great angles your house has, and they really are great, so look for a paint that makes you happy seeing next to the brick and the roof.

You're closer to MCM than to anything Spanish. Don't worry about brick not being an MCM material; you can change its look considerably with a product from Romabio. You're not doing a restoration here. Consider removing all the iron and columns. A nice MCM style fence can give you a bit of privacy to make that front patio useful.Could be wood slat or even the traditional block style. Eliminate all the arched details and replace the sash windows with some new MCM style windows that are taller, even if not able to afford taking them to the eaves. An MCM style front door, new outdoor lights and some MCM inspired house numbers on the left brick entry wall will finish all but the landscaping.

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Sunny Hills Residence · More Info

Thank you everyone for the great ideas and feedback! We really appreciate it and are going to go back to the drawing board with all these ideas and determine how we can enhance the unique features of our home and make it look its best. I'm sure I'll post again with more questions as we get further into the project and look forward to everybody's feedback. Thanks again!