The importance of a properly designed home office ( especially when the space is also used as a meeting-place/showroom ) entails the comfort & positive experience of your customer in the following manner: 1. Exclusive office space with its own entrance separate from rest of home. 2. Ergonomic customer seating and ample presentation surfaces. 3. Dedicated customer computer screen(s) detailing CAD drawings & presentation in a show and tell manner. 4. Proper lighting ( LED lighting has come a long way ) 5. Practical design touches ( hooks for purses, coats, umbrella stand, refreshments area, guest WIFI, etc...) One of the greatest benefits of a home office is the freedom to design it with a distinct identity. In other words, we shouldn’t blend the workplace with the rest of our personal space, aka home.

Photo: Carolyn Reyes © 2017 Houzz Terrace
Patio - transitional patio idea in Los Angeles

Adrienne DeRosa © 2014 Houzz Inc. Window boxes brimming with succulents lend a spot of color to the pool house's exterior. Jen chose a variety of perennial succulents for their hardiness and visual interest. "They have the texture and color that works perfectly in this area," she explains, "and they don't require a lot of maintenance." The boxes are made to be taken off in winter, when Ciacchi takes them inside and wraps them in burlap. Come spring, they are ready to go. Photo: Adrienne DeRosa © 2014 Houzz

The plaster Wet Room includes a custom built marble ofuro soaking tub.
Bathroom - large eclectic master white tile and marble tile dark wood floor, brown floor, double-sink and wood wall bathroom idea in Seattle with flat-panel cabinets, brown cabinets, a one-piece toilet, white walls, an undermount sink, marble countertops, white countertops, a niche and a floating vanity

The collection ‘Valde’ by MDD Office Furniture is high functional and beautifully crafted product. The company presents a huge variety of products for all industrial office interiors. Unique industrial reception desks from this collection are customizable for any preferences. Straight, convex and concave elements are at your disposal in any of the numerous wavy, circular and upright arrangements, which perfectly create the feeling of style and integrity for the reception area. Being a superb workspace, Valde also stands out for its creative design and cogent elegance emphasized by the precision of details. Horizontal slats made of aluminum emphasize a shape and a modern character of the body. The desk top made of tempered white glass perfectly matches the glittering frontal part of the counter. LED lighting located under the upper desk top and at the basis of the counter makes the reception desk presenting perfectly in darker rooms. The variety of products presented in this collection doesn’t leave anything to be desired. The collection ‘Valde’ by MDD Office Furniture is the best decision to be installed in any interior.

The collection ‘Valde’ by MDD Office Furniture is high functional and beautifully crafted product. The company presents a huge variety of products for all industrial office interiors. Unique industrial reception desks from this collection are customizable for any preferences. Straight, convex and concave elements are at your disposal in any of the numerous wavy, circular and upright arrangements, which perfectly create the feeling of style and integrity for the reception area. Being a superb workspace, Valde also stands out for its creative design and cogent elegance emphasized by the precision of details. Horizontal slats made of aluminum emphasize a shape and a modern character of the body. The desk top made of tempered white glass perfectly matches the glittering frontal part of the counter. LED lighting located under the upper desk top and at the basis of the counter makes the reception desk presenting perfectly in darker rooms. The variety of products presented in this collection doesn’t leave anything to be desired. The collection ‘Valde’ by MDD Office Furniture is the best decision to be installed in any interior.

Download our free ebook, Creating the Ideal Kitchen. DOWNLOAD NOW A tired primary bathroom, with varying ceiling heights and a beige-on-beige color scheme, was screaming for love. Squaring the room and adding natural materials erased the memory of the lack luster space and converted it to a bright and welcoming spa oasis. The home was a new build in 2005 and it looked like all the builder’s material choices remained. The client was clear on their design direction but were challenged by the differing ceiling heights and were looking to hire a design-build firm that could resolve that issue. This local Glen Ellyn couple found us on Instagram (@kitchenstudioge, follow us ?). They loved our designs and felt like we fit their style. They requested a full primary bath renovation to include a large shower, soaking tub, double vanity with storage options, and heated floors. The wife also really wanted a separate make-up vanity. The biggest challenge presented to us was to architecturally marry the various ceiling heights and deliver a streamlined design. The existing layout worked well for the couple, so we kept everything in place, except we enlarged the shower and replaced the built-in tub with a lovely free-standing model. We also added a sitting make-up vanity. We were able to eliminate the awkward ceiling lines by extending all the walls to the highest level. Then, to accommodate the sprinklers and HVAC, lowered the ceiling height over the entrance and shower area which then opens to the 2-story vanity and tub area. Very dramatic! This high-end home deserved high-end fixtures. The homeowners also quickly realized they loved the look of natural marble and wanted to use as much of it as possible in their new bath. They chose a marble slab from the stone yard for the countertops and back splash, and we found complimentary marble tile for the shower. The homeowners also liked the idea of mixing metals in their new posh bathroom and loved the look of black, gold, and chrome. Although our clients were very clear on their style, they were having a difficult time pulling it all together and envisioning the final product. As interior designers it is our job to translate and elevate our clients’ ideas into a deliverable design. We presented the homeowners with mood boards and 3D renderings of our modern, clean, white marble design. Since the color scheme was relatively neutral, at the homeowner’s request, we decided to add of interest with the patterns and shapes in the room. We were first inspired by the shower floor tile with its circular/linear motif. We designed the cabinetry, floor and wall tiles, mirrors, cabinet pulls, and wainscoting to have a square or rectangular shape, and then to create interest we added perfectly placed circles to contrast with the rectangular shapes. The globe shaped chandelier against the square wall trim is a delightful yet subtle juxtaposition. The clients were overjoyed with our interpretation of their vision and impressed with the level of detail we brought to the project. It’s one thing to know how you want a space to look, but it takes a special set of skills to create the design and see it thorough to implementation. Could hiring The Kitchen Studio be the first step to making your home dreams come to life?

Photo: Carolyn Reyes © 2017 Houzz Guest Bedroom Design team: Jeanne K. Chung of Cozy Stylish Chic
Bedroom - transitional bedroom idea in Los Angeles

Download our free ebook, Creating the Ideal Kitchen. DOWNLOAD NOW A tired primary bathroom, with varying ceiling heights and a beige-on-beige color scheme, was screaming for love. Squaring the room and adding natural materials erased the memory of the lack luster space and converted it to a bright and welcoming spa oasis. The home was a new build in 2005 and it looked like all the builder’s material choices remained. The client was clear on their design direction but were challenged by the differing ceiling heights and were looking to hire a design-build firm that could resolve that issue. This local Glen Ellyn couple found us on Instagram (@kitchenstudioge, follow us ?). They loved our designs and felt like we fit their style. They requested a full primary bath renovation to include a large shower, soaking tub, double vanity with storage options, and heated floors. The wife also really wanted a separate make-up vanity. The biggest challenge presented to us was to architecturally marry the various ceiling heights and deliver a streamlined design. The existing layout worked well for the couple, so we kept everything in place, except we enlarged the shower and replaced the built-in tub with a lovely free-standing model. We also added a sitting make-up vanity. We were able to eliminate the awkward ceiling lines by extending all the walls to the highest level. Then, to accommodate the sprinklers and HVAC, lowered the ceiling height over the entrance and shower area which then opens to the 2-story vanity and tub area. Very dramatic! This high-end home deserved high-end fixtures. The homeowners also quickly realized they loved the look of natural marble and wanted to use as much of it as possible in their new bath. They chose a marble slab from the stone yard for the countertops and back splash, and we found complimentary marble tile for the shower. The homeowners also liked the idea of mixing metals in their new posh bathroom and loved the look of black, gold, and chrome. Although our clients were very clear on their style, they were having a difficult time pulling it all together and envisioning the final product. As interior designers it is our job to translate and elevate our clients’ ideas into a deliverable design. We presented the homeowners with mood boards and 3D renderings of our modern, clean, white marble design. Since the color scheme was relatively neutral, at the homeowner’s request, we decided to add of interest with the patterns and shapes in the room. We were first inspired by the shower floor tile with its circular/linear motif. We designed the cabinetry, floor and wall tiles, mirrors, cabinet pulls, and wainscoting to have a square or rectangular shape, and then to create interest we added perfectly placed circles to contrast with the rectangular shapes. The globe shaped chandelier against the square wall trim is a delightful yet subtle juxtaposition. The clients were overjoyed with our interpretation of their vision and impressed with the level of detail we brought to the project. It’s one thing to know how you want a space to look, but it takes a special set of skills to create the design and see it thorough to implementation. Could hiring The Kitchen Studio be the first step to making your home dreams come to life?

For modern, mid century home office furniture, the Copeland-Catalina collection is best in its class. High end, designer desks, file cabinets and credenzas. Handcrafted in Vermont, this furniture is made to order, in natural solid black walnut or maple wood. Catalina home office furniture combines clean contemporary lines with organic and geometric wood forms. This solid hardwood, handmade office furniture is suggestive of the works of America’s Mid-Century Modern designers with it's retro-modern shapes and sensibilities. Check out the Top 10 Reasons to Buy Copeland Catalina Furniture Here at Vermont Woods Studios. Then Go Natural - Go Green with Copeland!

Property Marketed by Hudson Place Realty - Style meets substance in this circa 1875 townhouse. Completely renovated & restored in a contemporary, yet warm & welcoming style, 295 Pavonia Avenue is the ultimate home for the 21st century urban family. Set on a 25’ wide lot, this Hamilton Park home offers an ideal open floor plan, 5 bedrooms, 3.5 baths and a private outdoor oasis. With 3,600 sq. ft. of living space, the owner’s triplex showcases a unique formal dining rotunda, living room with exposed brick and built in entertainment center, powder room and office nook. The upper bedroom floors feature a master suite separate sitting area, large walk-in closet with custom built-ins, a dream bath with an over-sized soaking tub, double vanity, separate shower and water closet. The top floor is its own private retreat complete with bedroom, full bath & large sitting room. Tailor-made for the cooking enthusiast, the chef’s kitchen features a top notch appliance package with 48” Viking refrigerator, Kuppersbusch induction cooktop, built-in double wall oven and Bosch dishwasher, Dacor espresso maker, Viking wine refrigerator, Italian Zebra marble counters and walk-in pantry. A breakfast nook leads out to the large deck and yard for seamless indoor/outdoor entertaining. Other building features include; a handsome façade with distinctive mansard roof, hardwood floors, Lutron lighting, home automation/sound system, 2 zone CAC, 3 zone radiant heat & tremendous storage, A garden level office and large one bedroom apartment with private entrances, round out this spectacular home.

Chocolate Flower / Berlandiera lyrata Photo: Lisa Bird for Plant Select®
Inspiration for a landscaping in Denver.

Download our free ebook, Creating the Ideal Kitchen. DOWNLOAD NOW A tired primary bathroom, with varying ceiling heights and a beige-on-beige color scheme, was screaming for love. Squaring the room and adding natural materials erased the memory of the lack luster space and converted it to a bright and welcoming spa oasis. The home was a new build in 2005 and it looked like all the builder’s material choices remained. The client was clear on their design direction but were challenged by the differing ceiling heights and were looking to hire a design-build firm that could resolve that issue. This local Glen Ellyn couple found us on Instagram (@kitchenstudioge, follow us ?). They loved our designs and felt like we fit their style. They requested a full primary bath renovation to include a large shower, soaking tub, double vanity with storage options, and heated floors. The wife also really wanted a separate make-up vanity. The biggest challenge presented to us was to architecturally marry the various ceiling heights and deliver a streamlined design. The existing layout worked well for the couple, so we kept everything in place, except we enlarged the shower and replaced the built-in tub with a lovely free-standing model. We also added a sitting make-up vanity. We were able to eliminate the awkward ceiling lines by extending all the walls to the highest level. Then, to accommodate the sprinklers and HVAC, lowered the ceiling height over the entrance and shower area which then opens to the 2-story vanity and tub area. Very dramatic! This high-end home deserved high-end fixtures. The homeowners also quickly realized they loved the look of natural marble and wanted to use as much of it as possible in their new bath. They chose a marble slab from the stone yard for the countertops and back splash, and we found complimentary marble tile for the shower. The homeowners also liked the idea of mixing metals in their new posh bathroom and loved the look of black, gold, and chrome. Although our clients were very clear on their style, they were having a difficult time pulling it all together and envisioning the final product. As interior designers it is our job to translate and elevate our clients’ ideas into a deliverable design. We presented the homeowners with mood boards and 3D renderings of our modern, clean, white marble design. Since the color scheme was relatively neutral, at the homeowner’s request, we decided to add of interest with the patterns and shapes in the room. We were first inspired by the shower floor tile with its circular/linear motif. We designed the cabinetry, floor and wall tiles, mirrors, cabinet pulls, and wainscoting to have a square or rectangular shape, and then to create interest we added perfectly placed circles to contrast with the rectangular shapes. The globe shaped chandelier against the square wall trim is a delightful yet subtle juxtaposition. The clients were overjoyed with our interpretation of their vision and impressed with the level of detail we brought to the project. It’s one thing to know how you want a space to look, but it takes a special set of skills to create the design and see it thorough to implementation. Could hiring The Kitchen Studio be the first step to making your home dreams come to life?

Photo: Carolyn Reyes © 2017 Houzz Lady's Office Design team: Michael Wrusch
Home office - transitional home office idea in Los Angeles

The best of the past and present meet in this distinguished design. Custom craftsmanship and distinctive detailing lend to this lakefront residences’ classic design with a contemporary and light-filled floor plan. The main level features almost 3,000 square feet of open living, from the charming entry with multiple back of house spaces to the central kitchen and living room with stone clad fireplace. An ARDA for indoor living goes to Visbeen Architects, Inc. Designers: Vision Interiors by Visbeen with Visbeen Architects, Inc. From: East Grand Rapids, Michigan

Dining room - dining room idea in Detroit

Photo: Carolyn Reyes © 2017 Houzz Dining Room Design team: Reaume Construction & Design
Dining room - transitional dining room idea in Los Angeles

Built for the Bluff, A Sea Ranch Home is Remade from the Inside Out The house had always been grounded, on an ocean bluff at The Sea Ranch. It sits unencumbered, adjacent to one of the most dramatic stretches of the Sonoma coast with protected commons meadow to the east, uninterrupted Pacific views to the west, and a bluff trail running alongside. What it lacked was the feeling of home, one that could hold up its own against the natural landscape. The owners are entrepreneurs with deep involvement across tech, real estate, and development and they know how things are built. The Sea Ranch house had been in their lives for years, a second residence and a place for family to gather. Built for a different time, it felt more compromising than comfortable. Sitting in a closed off nook, the kitchen fit one cook at a time and turned its back on the rest of the house. The entry was dim and compressed, divided by a structural column that presented itself at exactly the wrong moment. The primary suite was small relative to the view outside it. A large rear bedroom sat behind a lowered ceiling with a bathroom that had never been added. The house was certainly worth the trouble of doing it right. What followed was not one project but four, each with its own design challenge, each addressed over a period of time. Where the House Meets the Ocean The most complex piece of the project, in both structural and spatial terms, was the kitchen expansion. The existing room was a single-person galley squeezed in as an afterthought with no meaningful connection to the dining room, the living space, or the deck outside. To make it useful for a family that cooks and gathers, it needed to grow outward into an existing patio and flow into the rooms around it. A big challenge was the roofline. Several planes at different pitches and angles converged directly where additional volume was needed. A new form had to join that geometry without reading as a correction. The solution found the simplest possible connection between the existing angles, a roofline that from outside the structure, appears entirely original. From the bluff trail where the addition is visible, there is no discernible seam. Inside, the kitchen is now open to the living and dining rooms without interruption. A large sliding glass door connects the space onto the rear deck. The deck itself was expanded and oriented so that the body of the house shields it from the coastal wind which is a common consideration that determines whether outdoor space at The Sea Ranch actually gets used. The result is a room that works for large family gatherings where no one feels cutoff, and one that makes the boundary between being inside and outside easy to ignore. Welcoming Light A structural column stood at the convergence of eight distinct roof planes in the entry. It was load-bearing, but it was also the reason the entry had always felt like a hallway rather than a welcoming arrival. With the structural engineer, a custom steel connector was designed to receive beams from six separate directions, redistributing the load through a single new continuous beam. The column was surgically removed. Three triangular skylights were then cut into the roof above, their shapes drawn from the existing geometry of the planes around them. The entry is now bright and open. The skylights feel native to the structure because they follow the logic already present in the roof. Two Suites, Two Views At opposite ends of the house, the two bedroom suites were each reconfigured, and each found a different way to introduce more of the landscape into the room. An addition to the primary suite extended the structure outward to create a wraparound plan with a loop from the bedroom through bath and closet that had not been possible before. The expansion opened a slot view from the tub and shower toward the ocean. The view is precise and private. The ocean view is present and deliberate. The rear bedroom absorbed an adjacent storage room to transform it into a full second suite with a vaulted ceiling, a large bathroom with a tub, a shower, and a sauna. A private fenced garden courtyard sits just beyond the glass bringing the outdoors inside. The tub was placed so that, looking past the courtyard and through the bedroom beyond, the ocean is visible at the far end. It is a long view and it makes the room feel larger and more settled than its footprint would suggest. Glass on Four Sides, Fire at the Center The main living and gathering room had always been caught between two competing facts: glass on four sides meant exceptional views but at The Sea Ranch, it also meant a cold room. A 360-degree cylindrical fireplace was added at the center on a raised stone base, providing radiant heat in every direction and giving the room a focal point around which a group naturally orients itself, whether that means two people at the end of the day or the whole family after dinner. Owners Who Picked Up the Tools The owner was not a passive client. they came with construction knowledge, specific ideas, and the desire to be an active part of the process, a dynamic that other architects may had found difficult, which Klopf Architecture accepted as an asset. They took it upon themselves to complete some of the work during construction, including the installation of a new radiant heating system beneath the floors. The radiant system added to the older and less-desirable forced-air setup. At The Sea Ranch, that change matters as the house sits close enough to the ocean and moving air competes with the sound of it, where radiant heat does not. Solar panels were added to the roof as part of the new system. Insulation was upgraded throughout the walls, roof, and crawl space. The house that had always had the right setting now holds warmth the way a house on the bluff should. They were also deeply involved in the design and selections throughout, and the finished house reflects both of them in ways that are specific rather than generic. The process took longer and moved through more iterations than a more arms-length relationship might have allowed. The result is more defined and personal because of it. The Landscape Holds Priority Every exterior decision was shaped by The Sea Ranch Design Standards, which require that buildings defer to the landscape around them rather than compete with it. Because this house sits on the bluff and is visible from the public trail, the additions faced a close review. Existing materials were matched. Geometries were resolved. The additions had to become indistinguishable from the original building. From the trail, the house reads exactly as it always has — low, cedar-clad, secondary to the meadow and the water. The setting holds priority. Inside, the house has been remade. Klopf Architecture Project Team: Geoff Campen and Trenton Jewett
Contractor: Shawn Bettega Construction
Photography: ©2025 Mariko Reed
Year Completed: 2023
Location: The Sea Ranch, CA

Example of a beach style family room design in Los Angeles