1906 Venice cottage gets a modern update

The loft space.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Indoors, a 14-foot vaulted ceiling adds physical and emotional volume to the combined kitchen, dining and living rooms. Ritch lightened up the surfaces with pickled oak flooring, rift oak veneer cabinetry, white walls and ceilings, and large skylights.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Ritch, pictured here, is a partner in 5D Studio, a design company specializing in contract furniture. He considers himself “a modernist, not a bungalow guy.” He describes his wife, Jennifer Ritch, who worked in the film industry and is now studying nursing, as “a minimalist who doesn’t want clutter.”

Ritch tackled the renovations himself, calling on his training in architecture and urban planning; however, he hired a contractor to handle the foundation and framing. “To cut costs, I did most of the finish work and managed all the subcontractors myself,” Ritch says. That kept the renovation budget to $220 per square foot.

Here where the old porch used to be, Ritch bumped out the living and dining room, enlarging the interiors by 150 square feet. Twin sets of French doors connect with the garden, now a series of terraced decks enclosed by a privacy fence made of horizontal slats and beveled siding, emulating the cottage exterior.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Because of its varied levels, the tiny entry courtyard accommodates multiple features, including a fire bowl, seating area and fountain – a far cry from the state of affairs when the couple bought the property in 2005 as a 950-square-foot bungalow that the city of Los Angeles had cited as a public eyesore.

“The house was worthless,” David Ritch says. “I bought it based only on the land value.”

The seller gave Ritch a set of plans for a three-story, 3,000-square-foot contemporary cube, similar to other homes in the neighborhood. “But it was a lot more house than I needed,” Ritch says, considering the scale of the 30-by-85 foot lot. Instead, the new owners decided to create a fresh (albeit smaller) home that fit their budget and aesthetic.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

By Debra Prinzing

The exterior is classic California bungalow: beveled siding, wood-trimmed windows, cheery gabled roof. But inside the Venice house, owners David and Jennifer Ritch have updated the 1906 cottage with clean lines, an open floor plan and modern furnishings. How does one meld early California architecture with the modern attitude and design preferences of a contemporary couple?

Step inside the entry gate and find out. …  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

New glass doors connect the living room to the outside.

Originally Ritch thought he would build from the ground up. He tried to give away the old bungalow on Craigslist to anyone who would haul it away. “I thought someone else could use it,” he says.

The gimmick caught the attention of a local television newscast and led to countless inquiries, but the $20,000 house-moving expense deterred prospective takers. That led to Plan B: Keep the bungalow, but give it a modern makeover.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

David and Jennifer Ritch hang out by the fire pit, where their dog Emma gets a seat of her own.

“Maintaining the original scale and character of the house was more in line with my design sensibilities,” Ritch says. “Rather than adding another large home to the neighborhood, my challenge was to get three bedrooms and two baths into less than 1,100 square feet.”  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

The dining alcove contains a 72-inch-long Parsons-style table that Ritch designed and built in walnut. Benches on both sides have an almost-invisible profile when stored under the table.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

The kitchen is an 8-by-8-foot square that opens to the living and dining areas. Ritch warmed it up with surfaces that echo furniture finishes; the hood, dishwasher and refrigerator are clad in the same oak used in the living room. Cabinets and drawers with hidden notch finger pulls instead of hardware give the cooking space an unfussy, tailored appearance, as do the Caesarstone quartz countertops.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

The view from the loft: The living area revolves around a new gas fireplace, left, embellished with an anise flower stencil from the Venice-based wall graphics company Blik. Other lighthearted touches include a shadowbox coffee table that Jennifer Ritch filled with feathered boas. An Eames molded plywood chair and a Nelson coconut chair provide seating along with a pit sofa modified to fit the small space.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Detail of the Blik graphic on the fireplace.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Bedrooms are small but light-filled and functional, thanks to IKEA closet systems, built-in cabinetry, windows and skylights, Ritch says.

At 11 by 21 feet, the brick-red master bedroom is the largest. A space-saving pocket door provides access to the room, which, miraculously, contains a 60-square-foot walk-in closet. Ritch modified a West Elm bed to fit the sleeping area and added a wall-to-wall picture rail as a headboard accent. Tilt-in, cottage-style windows give a nod to the home’s bungalow origins.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

The master bathroom is tiled in 1-inch white limestone squares. Ritch kept the palette light to make the bathroom feel larger and included custom ceiling-to-floor cabinets for maximum storage.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Both children’s bedrooms are 11 feet square, with windows on two sides and a desk tucked into a window alcove. Daria, 18, decorated the wall of her room with paint splatters and hand prints.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Aron, 11, chose green for his accent wall.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

David Ritch looks out the master bedroom windows to the backyard and a garage converted into a home studio.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Inside the home office.

Designer Mark Saffell, Ritch’s partner in 5D Studio, acknowledges that turning the old bungalow into a modern abode wasn’t the easiest solution.

“I knew David could do it, though, because he treated the renovations as just another design problem,” Saffell says. “The real challenge of the house was its size, and he played with that floor plan to make it feel larger than the actual square footage.”  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Jennifer Ritch and Emma outside the home office.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

A translucent fence separates the neighbor’s property from the walk leading from the Ritches’ house to the home office. The barrier provides some separation without blocking sunlight.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)

Wrapped by its horizontal-slat fence, the Ritches’ updated cottage stands next to one of its larger, boxy neighbors. By evaluating what they had and preserving the home’s original architecture, David and Jennifer Ritch now feel they have the best of both worlds — old and new.

“It’s far more rewarding to take something people would otherwise cast away and give it a new purpose,” Ritch says of the home he once considered tearing down. “I tried to show respect for the bungalow while also getting the modern style I love.”

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See how a young couple built a modern cube directly above their 1913 bungalow.  (Ken Hively / Los Angeles Times)