In designer Michaela Scherrer‘s all-white Pasadena bungalow, the guest suite comes with the ultimate minimalist spa bath, ancient Greek-style sunken bathtub included. Michaela is a member of the Remodelista Architect/Designer Directory, and we got to know her when we photographed her surpassingly calm quarters for the Remodelista book. Her style is meditative but far from monastic: She’s a master at using textural materials and layering pale tones (she mixes all her own paints—see DIY White Paint). Come dip into her Zen quarters.
Above: The guest room has a wall of custom cabinets built around the window. “The window seemed very lonely in the corner and needed something around it. The cabinets also created a nice ledge.” The doors have pencil edges and magnetic closures; they offer enough storage that nothing needs to be left in the open except by choice. The chair is the Piona by Giancarlo Piretti for Anonima Castelli, a vintage design that Michaela modified: “I pulled off the back bar, lowered the seat, and then re-covered it in white leather.” Above: The fifties desk is the Pyramid Table by Dutch designer Wim Rietveld, son of architect and designer Gerrit Rietveld of the De Stijl movement. Above: A silvery bedside vignette. The low metal table is a Cassina design that Michaela has had for years; the One Arm Sconce is by New York designer David Weeks. A metallic tote hangs on the wall. Above: Initially designed for a show house, the bed is covered with a white leather blanket stitched from Italian hides. Leather, Michaela points out, is relatively animal proof: It can be sponged off when her dogs leave paw prints and resists her cat’s claws. The wall art is one of Michaela’s mood boards (learn more about her technique and materials in our DIY Pinboards post). Above: Michaela gutted the original bathroom—an ornate French design—and created a tiny, stripped-down spa bath. To get the desired shade for the room, she mixed a pastel white base from Fine Paints of Europe with black, umber, and yellow pigments, a process that takes many trials. “I wanted a nuanced cool white,” she says. “But if I’m in a hurry, I use Decorator’s White from Benjamin Moore.” What looks like a niche above the sink is a piece of mirror inset into the wall. Above: The stone resin sink is a discontinued model by Como; the fixtures are Vola designs in matte steel. Above: The room’s most arresting feature is its tub made of cast concrete tinted to “look like aged stone” and detailed with Vola fixtures. Inspired by a sunken bathtub in ancient Crete that Michaela spotted on a postcard, it has a square opening—and extends for an additional 18 inches under the floor, so that the bather’s legs are partly subterranean. To get the design exactly as she envisioned it, Michaela sat down in the dirt when the room was a construction site and figured out the dimensions. “I didn’t want it to feel like a big hole in the room,” she says. “I wanted to keep the tub as minimal as possible while still being practical. The Greek one was submerged as well. It was a sliver in the floor.”
To see the rest of the house, go to pages 150-161 of the Remodelista book. Also see our Designer Visit with Michaela Scherrer.
This is an update; it originally appeared on May 19, 2014, as part of our Greek Isles issue.
You need to login or register to view and manage your bookmarks.
When you register as a free Member of the Remodelista family of websites (Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home), you gain access to all current posts plus 10 archived posts per month, our internal bookmarking tool, and the community bulletin board.
Access 10 archived posts (older than one year) per month on each site
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Unlimited access to the Product Catalogs, Design Travel sources, and Architect & Designer Directory listings
Choose from our ten newsletters to keep up with the latest on the sites
Or Subscribe for Maximum Value!
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
×
Subscribe to the Remodelista family of websites
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
×
Sorry! As a registered member you get 10 free posts from our archive (posts more than a year old) every 30 days. You have reached your limit for this 30-day period. If you would like to access unlimited posts from the archive (ad free, too), become a subscriber today, and keep reading as many articles as you want.
Full Access Individual Subscription
Benefits include:
Unlimited access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home sites
Ad-free browsing environment
Unrestricted access to 30,000+ archived posts
Receive the full-text daily newsletters
All features that Members have access to
Annual subscribers pay just 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
Sorry! You have reached your limit of three (3) free posts from our archive every 30 days. You can increase this to 10 posts by joining as a free Member, or read unlimited posts with no ads by becoming a paid Subscriber.
Subscribe to the Remodelista family of websites
For $5/month ($59.99 paid annually) you'll enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home and all the benefits of Membership.
Annual subscribers pay 50% off the monthly subscription price of $9.99
Become a Member at no charge
When you register as a free Member of the Remodelista family of websites (Remodelista, Gardenista, and The Organized Home), you gain access to all current posts plus 10 archived posts per month, our internal bookmarking tool, and the community bulletin board.
Congratulations on becoming a Subscriber to Remodelista, Gardenista and The Organized Home! You now have access to many great features across the sites:
Unlimited access to all three sites
Ad-free browsing environment
Unrestricted access to 30,000+ archived posts
Receive any of the newsletters, including the the full-text daily Remodelista and Gardenista newsletters
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Congratulations on joining as a free Member of Remodelista, Gardenista and The Organized Home! You now have access to many great features across the sites:
Access to all posts published in the past year
Access 10 archived posts (older than one year) per month on each site
Use of our internal bookmark tool, so you can save products, posts, and other pages for quick reference
Access to our community bulletin board so you can ask and answer design-related questions
Unlimited access to the Product Catalogs, Design Travel sources, and Architect & Designer Directory listings
Choose from our ten newsletters to keep up with the latest on the sites
If at any time you want to become a Subscriber and enjoy unlimited, ad-free access to all our content, just go to the My Account link and choose Subscribe.
Have a Question or Comment About This Post?
Start the Conversation