Retooling an auto garage into a family home
A N.Y.C artist and her family’s changing needs drive their house’s design
NEWYORK— Brass pendant lights dangle in the walnut-paneled sunken lounge. Low-slung sectional sofas await in plumtoned upholstery.
The space, in a recently renovated three-storey townhouse in Brooklyn, looks like something out of a1960s James Bond movie.
And it’s the space where, at least once a week, the homeowners — artist Tara Donovan and her husband, Robbie Crawford, an architect — settle in with their 8-year-old twin sons for dinner while watching “something dumb and funny and appropriate,” says Crawford. The boys set things up — the panelling on one wall opens to reveal a big flat-screen TV — while upstairs in the third-floor kitchen, Donovan and Crawford load dinner into a dumbwaiter as the credits begin to roll.
Donovan, 48, a native New Yorker, is renowned for using mundane materials to make large-scale sculptures — a midcareer retrospective of her work just opened at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver. And as her career has evolved, so has her home, with the latest ground-level renovation among the latest projects.
The building was a one-storey autobody garage listed for $750,000 when Donovan first saw it in 2005. The brick structure took up the entire 20by-95-foot lot and backed onto apublic playground. She sought help with her plan to transform it from Standard Architects.
Crawford, 39, was then an intern at the firm and also lived in the same neighbourhood. When he and Donovan would occasionally bump into each other, she would nudge him: “Where’s my model?” They began dating as second and third storeys were added on top of the garage, both levels aligned with the front lot line and set back on the rear. In 2007 they married. When they moved into the house, the front of the garage had become a carport with a honeycomb grille — of Donovan’s design — painted a glass-inspired blue-green. Behind the carport was her studio with the garage’s original concrete floor.
An office for her and her studio manager occupied the front of the second floor. On the third floor, the living room flowed into the kitchen, with the bedroom off that. The arrangement didn’t last long. When the boys were born, Donovan’s secondfloor office became their bedroom. Donovan and her studio manager moved their work space into a smaller area at the rear of the floor. The couple installed a Murphy bed outside the boys’ room.
As the twins grew up, the family yearned for more space. Donovan and Crawford switched things up again. She relocated her studio to a warehouse about 30 minutes away in Long Island City, and the transformation of the ground floor began — once more with the help of Standard. Today, a new staircase descends from the second floor with a generous landing where Crawford runs his own architecture firm, Crawford Practice.
At the bottom of the stairs, the entertaining zone begins. The renovation, which cost about $200 per square foot, has resulted in a setting where the twins can hang out with friends or their parents can have artworld acquaintances over for drinks and dinner. As well as the sunken lounge, there is a dining area with a table and chairs designed by British designer Tom Dixon. The kitchen features green-painted cabinetry where, on one side of the sink it hides an oven and refrigerator; on the other it hides a treadmill — not much used.
In the middle of the ground level, a large platform topped by black marble-patterned porcelain tile displays one of Donovan’s sculptures of aggregated spheres made of silver Mylar. As well, the relocated Murphy bed sits behind walnut panelling, ready for guests.
“Renovating the ground floor, that was so much fun for us,” Donovan said. “We both might have different ideas, and we hash it out. It’s a part of our relationship we both really enjoy.”