Thanks to a tiny ADU, an L.A. home transforms into a stunning art gallery and studio

Antonio Adriano Puleo didn’t mean to renovate his accepted 1946 bungalow successful the Glassell Park vicinity conscionable northbound of Mt. Washington, but aft consulting with architectural decorator Ben Warwas, who told him helium could alteration the location into a “forever home,” the creator changed his plans.

“I primitively wanted an ADU,” Puleo said of adding an accessory dwelling portion to grow the creation workplace successful his garage. “For me, it was astir having a bigger workplace and being capable to person collectors and curators travel to the studio.”

However, arsenic Warwas explored the two-bedroom location and country spot — the decorator had antecedently designed and built a wood platform successful Puleo’s backyard — helium began to envision a caller communicative for the spaces.

The Glassell Park location earlier the renovations.

(Ben Warwas)

The exterior of the location and ADU is present painted agleam yellow. There’s besides casual entree to the outdoors.

“The surviving country wasn’t large enough, and it featured a immense reddish ceramic fireplace that had doors connected either broadside of it, starring to the backyard,” said Warwas, who archetypal met Puleo erstwhile they were undergraduate students astatine Massachusetts College of Art (now called Massachusetts College of Art and Design). “To entree the outdoors, you had to locomotion down factual steps to a covered patio.”

Paired with a 3rd doorway disconnected the kitchen, the home’s entranceway to the backyard was awkward astatine best.

After touring the property, Warwas projected immoderate subtle changes: adding a 250-square-foot ADU to the garage, removing the fireplace and raising the ceiling tallness successful the surviving room; adding a loft chamber successful the attic; and redesigning the exterior of the house.

The beforehand of the 1946 location remains the same.

“It was a tiny project, but determination were a batch of issues with the house,” Warwas said. “I thought, ‘Why don’t I suggest 4 antithetic things and helium tin take 2 oregon 3 of them?’ He chose each four.”

Puleo, 49, purchased the bungalow successful 2010 for $387,500 aft seeing an advertisement for a two-bedroom location “priced good for a speedy sale” successful Glassell Park. Although lone 1,000 quadrate feet successful size, the location offered a backyard for his canine and a detached garage.

“The store was truly the draw,” Puleo said. “The happening astir the location that attracted maine is that it had a abstraction that could beryllium a studio.”

The surviving country of Puleo’s Glassell Park location earlier it was redone.

(Ben Warwas)

Puleo, standing, and Warwas successful the surviving country today. “We some person a emotion of design,” Puleo said of his longtime friend.

Shortly aft purchasing the house, Puleo renovated the room and bathroom, opened up the partition betwixt the 2 spaces and widened the room door. “There were truthful galore doors,” helium said of the compartmentalized level plan. “Doors successful the kitchen; doors successful the eating room.”

Still, it wasn’t casual to scope the garage, which housed his creation studio, and the adjacent laundry room. “I was ever frustrated with the location due to the fact that it was not maximizing abstraction efficiently,” Puleo said. “The workplace was detached, and we had to participate done a gate.”

And truthful the makeover began.

Warwas tore retired the fireplace and extended the surviving country by six feet, adding a sleek Fleetwood sliding doorway that provided instant entree to the backyard. Then, helium raised the ceiling of the surviving country and added a sculptural curve that wholly transformed the surviving space.

Because the location had a analyzable extortion and an accessible attic, Warwas past transformed the attic into a loft that Puleo uses arsenic his main bedroom. (The 2 bedrooms connected the archetypal level are utilized arsenic a den and a assemblage space/guest room.) Thanks to the precocious ceilings and a caller skylight, the attic present floods the halfway of the surviving country beneath with earthy light.

Puleo’s patterned canvases bent successful the ADU.

The ADU, which is attached to the garage, and conscionable six inches from the main house, features a kitchen, bath and surviving area. Puleo is utilizing it arsenic portion of his creation studio.

“Little tweaks wholly transformed the house,” Warwas said.

In the garage, Warwas designed an ADU that tin relation arsenic an creation workplace oregon rental, featuring a tiny kitchen, bath and capable country for a bed. The plan of the ADU was cautiously considered to maximize abstraction and light, with a skylight and precocious model flooding the abstraction with light.

A level displacement offers a melodramatic acquisition erstwhile you measurement into the ADU, arsenic the level drops beneath to the creation workplace and the ceiling goes up, creating a consciousness of spaciousness.

Puleo chose agleam bluish tiles from Daltile for the ablution of the ADU.

The surviving country of the main location is present unfastened and airy, with customized cabinets and millwork by James Melinat that showcase the artwork Puleo made himself and the pieces helium has collected for much than 30 years, including ceramic pendants by Torbjörn Vejvi and Courtney Duncan, vessels by Bari Ziperstein and Pilar Wiley, and paintings by Patricia Fernández and Steven Criqui.

The surviving room’s fireplace is gone, but the woody mantle remains atop a console down the sofa, graced with a bid of colorful ceramic planters by Ashley Campbell and Brian Porray of Happy Hour Ceramics.

“Ben and I person known each different since we were successful college,” Puleo said, emphasizing their long-standing narration and the collaborative quality of their process. “The amusive happening astir the task is that we did a batch of backmost and distant successful presumption of communicating shapes and forms. We some person a emotion of design, and Ben does a large occupation of utilizing accepted materials successful a mode that ignites them and increases the dynamics of a space.”

On a caller visit, Warwas was inactive fine-tuning location betterment possibilities. “You could enactment a stackable washer and dryer here,” helium suggested to Puleo arsenic they stood successful the hallway. (Puleo had moved the appliances from the laundry country successful the store to the basement of the main house.)

Similarly, Warwas appreciates Puelo’s curatorial skills. “He’s made his location truthful personal,” Warwas said of his friend, who, for the past year, has featured the works of section artists successful 1 of the downstairs bedrooms, which served arsenic an creation gallery.

“It’s an astonishing house,” Warwas said of the interiors, which are enhanced by the artworks and marque visitors consciousness connected to the space.

“People often instrumentality notes erstwhile they travel to visit,” Puleo said of his creation collection.

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1. Designer Ben Warwas stands wrong the 250-square ft ADU, which features a gangly model and a skylight. 2. In the erstwhile garage, stairs from the creation workplace pb up to the ADU and bathroom. (Lisa Boone / Los Angeles Times )

From the sidewalk, the accepted stucco bungalow looks similar truthful galore others successful the neighborhood. But measurement into the backyard, past the colorful paintings, textiles, tiles, stained solid and ceramics and the caller rear exterior — painted a agleam yellowish — and it’s similar a wholly antithetic property.

“The beforehand of the location didn’t change, and the backmost of the location is wholly different,” Warwas said of the exterior, which reminds him of a portion of insubstantial that has been chopped up and folded together. “It’s a amusive moment.”

That helium was capable to wholly alteration the location without adding overmuch quadrate footage does not flight him. “It creates a scenery wherever you tin question backmost and forth, and the plot is present overmuch much a portion of the house,” Warwas said. “The gait got smaller, but it feels bigger.”

A stained-glass sheet by Puleo hangs successful the bathroom.

Mixed-media pieces by Megan Reed are connected show successful Puleo’s chamber creation gallery.

Despite a $95,000 ADU summation yet increasing into a $320,000 overhaul for the property, Puleo is blessed to person the flexibility that comes with surviving successful a location with 2 abstracted spaces.

“I could adhd a lofted furniture and unrecorded successful the ADU and marque creation and rent retired the location if I wanted,” Puleo said. “It would let maine to spell backmost and distant betwixt the East and West coasts and thatch and beryllium with my household successful Boston.”

As helium sat taking it each successful from his eating country array overlooking the San Gabriel Mountains, the creator said, “The location is ace businesslike now. This is simply a magical space.”

Puleo besides chose colorful textiles for his canine Ono’s bed.