Our lovely decade-spanning “Little Big House”

Guest post by Beretta Fleur

The offbeat occupant: Beretta Fleur! Designer, writer, artist, domestic perfectionist, pinup model, frequent Offbeat Home contributor.

Other occupants: Husband, Dogs #1 and #2, and Moses Cat

Approximate square footage: 1000-2000 sq. feet

How many bedrooms? 2

Lives in: Los Angeles, California

Please…

Let’s start with the neighborhood. What’s it like where you live? It’s a nice blend of ethnicities, lifestyles, and classes, which is typical of LA’s urban sprawl. Most of the houses on our street are the same style, and there are many mature trees. It’s very leafy and green and for being in a major city it has a very suburban feel.

Living Room

What makes your home offbeat? Husband’s style is The IT Crowd meets Han Solo and my style is pinup meets Anthropologie.

Dogparts and bird dreams

Rock Wall TubWhat’s the most challenging about this space? How do you deal with the challenge? Not enough storage. We have a few closets, but the “Weird Sex Room” (so named because of the swanky in-room Rock Wall Tub) is the primary holding space for all of our sporting and camping equipment, suitcases that need to be unpacked when we travel, etc.

We have shelving, so it’s “dealt with” in this way… but it’s just a shame that we have to have open shelves in such an awesome space.

We wish there were about four more closets. We’ve even down-sized on our stuff over the past year, but both the previous tenant and the landlady concur that there’s just not a lot of room.

What’s your favorite feature of your home? Definitely the den and the yard. It’s where the magic happens.

Brick BBQ

We can host people on cold days by the fire sipping whiskey, or in the summer with the hot tub and BBQ. Every day feels like vacation in our home.

The Den Bar
We just love the bookshelves and glass cases back there. The exposed beams and wood paneling are amazing. The bar itself is perfect for informal dinners while we talk about our day.

Our garden

The yard is so full of “spaces”… we can host dinners on the covered patio, lounge in the hot tub, or take our wine and a blanket to the back yard, which is strung with lights. On weekends, we garden, clean out the water feature, and prune the fruit trees. It’s our little slice of heaven on Earth and a great way to relax from what for both of us is usually a pretty hectic work week.

Dining Area

What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned from this home? Interesting Shower TileThat there are seasons of feasting and seasons of famine, but Home is truly where you are loved, no matter what it looks like, aesthetically speaking.

Our first year and a half together were spent living in a horrible neighborhood in a tiny apartment, saving money for our life together. We couldn’t host people that whole time! We really needed this place. We had a wedding reception Save The Date, with no venue. But we just wanted to be together, so for a long time, we made it work.

We went on exhaustive searches with several rental agents and nothing was working out. Then, five months before we were scheduled to have our reception, this dropped into our lap.

Circle Dance!!!!

We were very fortunate to have this place to call home for now, and every day we feel gratitude over our lovely, perfect Little Big House.

What advice do you have for other offbeat homies? Make the most of your home, keep it safe, and treat it well. It’s your calm place, a reflection of you, and where you can truly be yourself — so revel in that.

Any stuff or services you want to recommend? As someone who LOVES to cook, I have an apron fetish … I just love all the ones Dot’s Diner has on Etsy.

Show me the decor porn!

Comments on Our lovely decade-spanning “Little Big House”

  1. Totally understand the small space thing! Fun house for sure! Love the dining room table – ok I have been looking for one forever so they jump out at me. Where did you get your table and chairs.

    • Ikea! They don’t sell the chairs anymore though. The nice thing about it is it folds way down. The one in our back yard is also Ikea and it folds waaay way down, and was reasonable in price too. Perfect for smaller spaces.

  2. I love your house. It looks homey, like my house when I was growing up. I also love that you have a hot tub inside (I’d say that’s pretty offbeat!). Another thing, that light fixture on the wall that looks like a spiral is fabulous-I need more information on it! Also, I need that sign for when we have parties. I tend to get pretty drunky at our parties, and that sign could be the perfect thing. 🙂

      • I add my voice to the request for pdf signage! I have three indoor cats and am always terrified they’re going to sneak outside through one of our two sliding glass doors when people are over. I love that the sign conveys this super-important pet safety need without being a boring drag – it adds to the fun party atmosphere without being a buzzkill!

  3. omg! My Parents have that exact same owl clock! It was the first thing they bought together as a couple and its probably close to 30 years old now. seeing yours made me all warm and fuzzy 🙂

  4. Thanks for sharing your home with us! I love the contrasting styles of the first pics of the modern dining room and then the wood filled bar area/living room later in the slide show. It’s great to see a house doesn’t have to have one ‘theme’ for decorating. I also love the owls that you appear to have around your house.

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