WHEN Darryl Wilson says he knows "what makes a house work," he isn't just talking about floor plans and furniture placement. For years the 49-year-old designer has defrayed the cost of renovating his residences by getting them paying gigs as locations for magazine fashion spreads and print ads.
"The houses that work are the ones with tons of glass and natural light, a simple white box with midcentury furniture," he says. "Photographers and their clients also love the sexy backdrop of a city view."
Three years ago, Wilson found a Beverly Hills makeover project that was all that -- with a fish-shaped swimming pool and a side of Hollywood history. The 6,000-square-foot ranch home was built in 1958 by Eddie and Toni Mannix, a powerful MGM vice president and his wife, the adulterous duo portrayed by Bob Hoskins and Diane Lane in the current release "Hollywoodland." The property included an Asian-style cabana inspired by the film "The Teahouse of the August Moon."
Any vestiges of a movie colony mansion, however, had been "bastardized" with bad 1970s fixtures, ceramic tile floors, wood ceilings and rock fireplaces, Wilson says. After renting the house once -- to a photographer for FHM men's magazine, which shot actress Teri Hatcher straddling Wilson's washing machine -- Wilson reimagined it as "the type of house stars would've lived in during the glamorous and groovy era when the Polo Lounge and Perino's were swinging."
Deco-inspired doors with $500 Lucite knobs, triple-bevel-edged marble countertops and other custom elements add up to Wilson's design vision: Rat Pack modern with a Parisian accent. It is, he says, a home that reflects the elegance of European hotels and the ease of Southern California living, an amalgamation of everything he has loved in old movies and his extensive travels.
"Darryl has taken one of the predominant decorating trends of the moment, Hollywood glamour, and given it his own flair for luxury," says Stefan Lawrence, owner of the L.A. gallery Twentieth, where Wilson frequently shops. "What makes him distinctive as a designer is his ability to recognize the potential of the architecture as it exists and then execute perfectly correct interiors from start to finish."
Wilson's instincts, much to his surprise, led him to a design scheme that was more about what a house could do for him than what he could do for a house. This time, the makeover was personal.
