Colour and light transform renovated Palo Alto Eichler home

Architect Gustave Carlson and interior designer Jessica Davis of Atelier Davis give a new lease of life to a Palo Alto Eichler home

Exterior of the house with black walls and a red bike outside
(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

A Palo Alto Eichler home has been transformed into a 21st-century domestic haven, by a team comprising architect Gustave Carlson and interior designer Jessica Davis of Atelier Davis. The house was originally one of the schemes of seminal 20th-century real estate developer Joseph Eichler, which sought to bring modernist architecture to the everyday family home. Examples of its type can now be found all over California and are often affectionately called ‘Eichlers' – yet this is possibly the only one of its kind in the hills of Palo Alto and Los Altos.

The home's current owners, Florie Hutchinson and her husband, were after a spacious, comfortable and stylish base in which to raise their four children; when they spotted this property on the market, they snapped it up. With Carlson, Davis and landscape designer Kasorn Piamsukon of Ground Cover Landscaping, they worked to redesign the space into a robust yet elegant interior, light and at the same time sturdy and suitable for family life. 

Inside beach vibe seating area with sofa, egg chairs and wooden walls

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

In order to enhance the sense of space, Carlson removed partitions and cleaned up the interior space, while adding puncturing the structure to create an atrium skylight above. This completely transforms the living area below, flooding it with natural light. Strategically chosen pieces of furniture, such as the swing hanging from the roof structure, further accentuate this height and generosity. 

Keeping the architecture clean and fairly monochromatic, using black, white and off-white tones in materials such as wood, cork and natural stone, creates a sophisticated backdrop for a decor that adds colour in layers, employing blues, corals, and yellows throughout. Meanwhile, an art collection comprising primarily (some 90 per cent) female artists further elevates the space. 

A fresco by Mariel Capanna in the hallway, for example, welcomes guests. ‘Every element of the fresco makes us smile and is a time capsule of our family and this bizarre time of global instability,' says Hutchinson.

Seating area with wooden walls and glass roof

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Kitchen area with wicker chairs around a brown island

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Living space with art hanging on the wall

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Seating area with grey sofa, coffee table and tall ceilings

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Blue and red bathroom cabinet

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Khaki green bathroom cabinet with mirror above it

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Blue storage area in mud room

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

Seating area with red sofa and green walls with paintings on

(Image credit: David Duncan Livingston)

INFORMATION

gustavecarlsondesign.com

atelierdavis.com

Ellie Stathaki is the Architecture & Environment Director at Wallpaper*. She trained as an architect at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece and studied architectural history at the Bartlett in London. Now an established journalist, she has been a member of the Wallpaper* team since 2006, visiting buildings across the globe and interviewing leading architects such as Tadao Ando and Rem Koolhaas. Ellie has also taken part in judging panels, moderated events, curated shows and contributed in books, such as The Contemporary House (Thames & Hudson, 2018), Glenn Sestig Architecture Diary (2020) and House London (2022).