THINKING ABOUT HOUSES

Now that Christmas is over my thoughts turn once again to what kind of house I can expect to live in when I move out of L.A. (Sigh!) I'll miss the California ranch style (above).

If I end up with a small house maybe I can convert it into something nice. I like the simple, open-plan living room, above. The blue sofa makes a nice contrast with the varnished wood.

Here's (above) a light and airy living room furnished by Ikea. The curtains unexpectedly turn out to be a potent unifying element.

I like wide living rooms with low ceilings. This room (above) is by Frank Lloyd Wright. 

In California you hear of people converting outdoor pre-fab tool sheds into tiny offices. It would be a place to get work done if the house were too noisy. I wonder what the zoning laws say about this.

Here's (above) another outdoor office. Gee, all that glass would make it hard to heat. It looks great, though.

Wow! I love the way this dark, woody bedroom looks! It would be like sleeping in a cabin in the Klondike.

This unusually dark room raises a question: would it be wise to allow each bedroom to have its own unique look and feel? Would a house with wildly different rooms be a platypus?

BEDROOM DESIGN

Here's (above) a bedroom from Frank Lloyd Wright's Heart Island House. What do you think of it? For me it's too formal, too much like a terrific living room that just happens to have a bed in it. It lacks..."bedroomness." Wright was a peerless designer of living rooms but his imagination failed him when it came to bedrooms and kitchens.

 Ditto for Cliff May, another of my favorite architects. Bedrooms seem to have bored him. This one (above) looks like he devoted no thought to it at all.

For good bedroom ideas I find myself turning to less well-known designers. What do you think of this dark, low ceiling bedroom (above)? It's cozy and fun...evocative, too. It's like a Goldrush cabin in the Klondike or the Captain's quarters of an old 19th Century sailing ship.

I like to imagine that this room is one or two steps down from the level of the rest of the house, and that prompts an interesting question: is it a good idea to graft a cool historical bedroom onto a stylistically modern house? I'd say yes, but lots of people would disagree.

I like this (above) well-lit Ikea bedroom. I don't like what looks like a plain particle board cupboard on the extreme left, but the general layout seems fine. You can't see it from this angle but the headboard of the bed is a bookshelf on the side that faces the window. There's room to walk back there.

Here's a modest but still cozy bedroom idea, also from Ikea. It's cheery and even pleasingly austere, as if a nun sleeps there. Once again the lighting makes a big difference.