A FINE VINTAGE

A 1942 Sunset cover house is meticulously restored, recreating the romance of an early California ranch home, capturing the splendor of the Carmel Valley, and reclaiming some of the mid-century magic of life in the West.

- CHRISTINE LENNON

WHEN Jeff Webster and Kimberly Clemenson began their search for a home in which to spend their retirement years enjoying the pleasant microclimate of the Carmel Valley, they knew their expectations were almost absurdly high. They wanted substantial acreage and charm, an opportunity to create a “gentleman’s farm” with an expansive vegetable garden and orchard, and to create the kind of welcoming retreat that their adult children couldn’t wait to visit. The biotechnology executives from Thousand Oaks were eagerly preparing for their next chapter, when they could suit up in their garden gear and get to work, planting grapevines and fruit trees and enjoying the sunny days, cool nights, and majestic coastline the region is known for.

“I was born here in Carmel, and I have family here,” Webster says. “And we’d had a home in Pacific Grove for years. We always knew that this is where we would land.”

“It just took us a few years of searching to find the perfect spot,” Clemenson says.

The day they set foot in the house you see in these photos, which was wildly overgrown and crumbling from over 40 years of neglect, it required some creative thinking to come to the conclusion that this was the lucky break they were waiting for. The house, which sat on a nine-acre parcel, was designed and built by Hugh Comstock in 1939. Comstock (1893– 1950) created the “fairytale” architectural vernacular of nearby Carmel, building quaint cottages that combined redwood timber framing and adobe styles. When Webster and Clemenson squinted a little, they could see their dreamhouse, with a sparkling pool surrounded by lavender and oaks.