Martyn Lawrence Bullard’s Mediterranean Villa in the Hollywood Hills
A 1920s villa with a Hollywood past, rebuilt around Moorish detail and a lifetime of collections
I have always loved houses with history, and my latest LA house is no exception. It was home to Andy Warhol and Tina Turner, and most famously to Dennis Hopper through the 1960s.
There is a twist to this tale. I had already decorated this house twenty years earlier, for Craig Kilborn. A year of work later, with an extension, a new kitchen, a bar and a screening room, it became my home.
For the decor I banished the Spanish style and added a Moorish energy instead: zellige tilework, Italian marble, carved doors with Moravian star motifs, and a hand painted Marrakesh style barrel vault in the living room.
“My home is my experiment pad, a kind of mad scientist’s lab where I mix textures and colors to find the perfect potion. It also houses a lifetime of collections that both inspire and delight me in the most personal way.”
Martyn Lawrence Bullard
My home bar is papered in my Royal Fernery for Cole and Son. The custom brass bar carries mashrabiya screens, mirror backed and ebonized, a nod to Warhol’s tenure in this room.
My kitchen serves as the heart of the home. Zellige tile for the backsplash, Arabescato marble for the countertops and the island, and lights from my own collection for a vintage vibe.
The primary bedroom has a panoramic wallpaper on the bed wall, a custom bed and 1950s Italian nightstands. The Moorish keyhole entry into the bathroom frames the brass tub.
A guest bedroom has my Cole and Son paper on the ceiling and Ann Sacks tiles as the baseboard detail. The Lisbon bed is from my furniture line and the bedside tables are Fornasetti.
Vintage pink paint makes a cosy sanctuary for guests in the Rose suite, and the tub set into the turret looks out over downtown LA and the ocean beyond.
My screening room is tented in an ikat striped cotton over encaustic tiled floors. It is my personal sanctuary, where I watch movies and cuddle my beloved wheaten terrier, Daisy.
The home is splendid for entertaining, with its tiered garden and outdoor firepits and bars, yet it has an intimacy that lets you snuggle in and enjoy quiet time.
The house was published in Elle Decor, October 2019, the 30th Anniversary Collector’s Edition.
Star Style
This project appears in Star Style by Martyn Lawrence Bullard, his collection of the interiors he has created for the people who shape modern taste. Signed copies are available here.
