This Designer Beautifully Transformed a Charming 1940s Silver Lake Bungalow

“The first thing I noticed about the home was that it felt hidden,” he admits. “I had been on the exact part of that street many times before and never even knew there was this secret set of stairs going down.”

This was also the first time Gabriel had ever heard the term “pocket listing” (a property for sale that’s not publicly listed); the owner of the two-bedroom house hadn’t officially put it on the market. To secure the purchase, Gabriel didn’t just submit an offer the day after he toured the house — he also included a personal letter.

“I suppose it’s pretty unusual but after the closure, [the previous owner] met me at the house, showed me around, and took me to his favorite spots in the neighborhood,” Gabriel explains. “It was so nice to have someone I could reach out to if I needed to know a certain paint color.”

Gabriel’s chapter in the house, which was built in 1940, began about three-and-a-half years ago. But the principal designer and founder of the design agency New Operations Workshop didn’t immediately jump into a major renovation.

“I started by renovating the living spaces and bedrooms because there was less major work there. Painting the brown trims and window frames white, and adding a wall-through shelf between the dining and living rooms, and a metal arch,” he describes of the smaller updates he tackled first.

In fact, he lived in the house for almost two years before undertaking a renovation of the kitchen and bathroom — spaces that would need more work. Kitchens cabinets in the 1940s were more shallow compared to the ones today, so to retain the house’s original ones they had to be modified to fit larger modern appliances. A gorgeous custom terrazzo countertop was poured on-site to complement the kitchen’s existing charm. 

The bathroom was a complete gut reno, and Gabriel “blew out” the dropped ceiling in order to add a large skylight. New floors and tile walls create a chic, earthy color palette. And a very cool and creative DIY makes a statement. “I ended up DIYing the latex skirt for the sink to hide storage below it,” he explains. “It was really fun to teach myself how to work with latex.”

“I wanted to keep as much of the 1940s charm so a lot of the design work was just adding new coats of paint and accentuating elements that were already there,” he describes of the home’s overall transformation, which in total (including the major kitchen and bathroom updates) cost about $130k.

Considering how serene and stylish the final result is, I’d say it was worth every penny. 

• Fiber Art Wall Piece “folding” — Luam Melake
• Sofa — Vintage Marenco
• Pk22 Lounge Chair — Poul Kjaerholm
• Console Table — New Operations Workshop
• Pendant — Rich Brilliant Willing
• Vintage Floor Light — Eileen Gray
• Triangular Art Piece — Greg Copeland
• Table Lamp — Isamu Noguchi
• Hanging Chair — Studio Stirling

• Chairs — House of Leon
• Dining Table — Custom
• Photograph — Wolfgang Tillmans

• Dishware — Hasami
• Ceramics — Vintage
• Pendant — Luft Tanaka
• Photograph — Hiroshi Sugimoto

• Accent Chair — Waka Waka
• Sconces — Charlotte Perriand
• Rug — Dhoku
• Photograph on Floor Shelf — Paul Sepuya

• Photograph — Hiroshi Sugimoto

• Lounge Chairs — Ferm Living
• Dining Table — Richard Schultz
• Wire Chairs — Eames

This tour’s responses and photos were edited for length/size and clarity.
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