If you didn’t know that this century-old brownstone was in Park Slope, Brooklyn, it might be easy to mistake it for a contemporary home in Los Angeles, thanks to a striking blend of coastal charm and urban sophistication. The artful amalgam is the work of a bicoastal design and architectural team. Hailing from the West Coast, you have artist-turned-interior designer Dara Kay Barker, while for architectural expertise and detailing, the clients enlisted Brooklyn’s own Kim Letven of NV/design.architecture.
“The clients are a young family with two children,” Dara tells us. “Their main goal was to create a home that was flexible and adaptable to the different needs of their growing family, while also reflecting their desire for a modern-yet-timeless aesthetic.”
Their wish list included distinct spaces that could serve multiple purposes—like a dedicated TV lounge that could also work as a guest suite, and a specific kids’ floor with a playroom that felt light and airy. “A must-have for them was a strong connection to the outdoors, especially with green views, as well as modern design details that respected the home’s historical character,” Dara explains.
“There were a lot of functional requests as the house needed to feel safe for children and have all the systems seamlessly integrated both functionally and aesthetically, such as a Lutron system for the lighting and shade controls and new HVAC and sprinkler systems throughout,” Kim adds.
Dara’s West Coast influence is clear in the way the design blurs the boundaries between indoor and outdoor living. “I used expansive Panoramic brand glass doors to bring in light and views of the greenery outside—two walls of glass that open up completely, creating a seamless transition between the interior and the two patios,” she explains. “The biggest challenge was maximizing space in a city home, especially when working with limited square footage and an existing layout. But this also became a benefit, pushing us to think creatively about how to make every inch of the house functional, with spaces like the basement and the kids’ floor serving dual purposes.”
Kim says it was an interesting architectural experience. “Dara brought a really unique West coast perspective to the project which I wasn’t initially aware even existed,” she shares. “She questioned a lot of the traditional townhouse rules about layout and style that had become sort of ingrained in us from years of experience. Typically, clients want a lot of traditional detail to be recreated if it’s been lost, as it was in this house, but she wasn’t afraid to modernize and push the envelope a bit stylistically. Also, a lot of times we had to take a step back and review the scale together because the project was so different in the scale of the spaces from the West Coast.”
The project took almost two years from start to finish. “When the clients saw the finished space, they were overjoyed,” Dara says. “They expressed how the house felt not only like a reflection of their personal style but also a functional, adaptable home for their growing family—and it has the added bonus of being directly across from their son’s school. They loved how the spaces could evolve with their needs, and the seamless connection between the indoors and outdoors was exactly what they had envisioned.”
Take a tour in the slideshow.
