the xx factor

A 1920 Berkeley home, shaped by talented temale designers across two centuries, is vibrantly updated for modern living

- CHRISTINE LENNON

From the start, interior designer Lauren Geremia knew that the grand house she was hired to refresh and reimagine, a vintage gem in Berkeley, California, built in 1920 by the pioneering female architect Julia Morgan, was uncommonly terrific. A Bay Area legend, Morgan designed some 700 structures, including hundreds of private homes, in and around San Francisco in the early 20th century. Demand for her talent peaked after the 1906 earthquake leveled many beloved buildings and left those that she built, sturdily, with decorative skins covering thick concrete walls, untouched. Morgan was at the forefront of the Arts and Crafts movement, and her most exquisite works (Hearst Castle, the Berkeley City Club, Julia Morgan Hall at the UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley) are now historic landmarks.

The well-preserved seven-bedroom Colonial with formal gardens on a winding Berkeley street was in an atypical style for Morgan. The story goes that the Glide family commissioned three houses in the neighborhood as wedding gifts for each of their daughters, and this one, with a Georgian façade, must have been a special request. Its formal rooms and overgrown gardens looked like they could have been plucked from England and dropped in California. That history and stylistic dichotomy appealed to its new owners, who were returning to the States after a stint in London with three young daughters of their own.

"I was looking pretty casually on Zillow when I saw the listing for this house," says the husband, who works in real estate. He grew up in the neighborhood and had always planned to return one day to raise his own family. Aware of Morgan's contribution to the community, he called a local friend and asked her to go take a look "to see if it was worth it for me to get on a plane," he recalls. Nine days later, the house was the family's new home.