NEAT WITH A TWIST

For a couple’s prewar apartment in Lower Nob Hill, a straight-up gentlemanly redesign just wouldn’t do

For a couple’s prewar apartment in lower Nob Hill, a straight-up gentlemanly redesign just wouldn’t do

F or some, the kitchen is the heart of the home. For Daniel Maimin and Mark Savery, who live in the Belgravia, a prewar building in Lower Nob Hill, it’s the library. The library in their two-bedroom, 1,800-square-foot apartment has built-ins painted a glossy peacock blue and a wet bar with a backsplash of gold-leafed tile — an intimate, glamorous space where the couple read, watch TV and entertain friends. “People just stop and gape at it,” says Savery, who works in tech.

Despite its Old World opulence, from the appliqued ceiling molding to the finely detailed bookcases, the room was completely redone — a key part of the apartment’s gut renovation by Karen Curtiss of San Francisco-based Red Dot Studio. She took her cues from the 1913 Beaux Arts building, which has elaborate details such as carved marble baseboards. At the same time, she also honored the clients’ request to kick it up a notch. “We wanted to make it ours — we didn’t want to play it safe,” says Maimin, who does marketing for luxury condominium developments and knew what generic “good taste” looked like.

“We tried to find the right mix of exuberance and restraint,” says Curtiss, whose somewhat unconventional career path may partly account for the diversity of her portfolio. The onetime competitive fencer has a master’s in interior

Previous spread: Daniel Maimin snuggles with Oscar the cat while husband Mark Savery plays the Steinway in the living room; the painting is by an unknown artist. This page: The apartment’s white hallway is enlivened by Osborne & Little’s Butterfly...