The guest bathroom, with its distinctive custom-designed mosaic mirror, reflects interior designer Milo Baglioni's attention to detail throughout the home. He found the Thor light fixtures at DIVA in Los Angeles and paired them with a Philippe Starck faucte and stainless-steel and wood sink.
Star has been an avid modern art collector for a number of years, but with no great places in his former homes to hang the art. When thinking about the renovation of this new house, deciding where the art -- including a number of works he owns by Ed Ruscha -- should go in the space was the most fun for him. Star worked with interior designer Milo Baglioni to incorporate the art into the decor. "The house is very much about the art," he asserts. It was important that the balance of shapes and colors or the feeling or mood of the art could be seen or experienced from the best vantage point possible but also that the decor provided a clean, uncluttered, and comfortable environment in which to view it. Baglioni used contemporary furnishings in soft upholstery and neutral colors to create the desired effect.
Star looks for the same qualities in interior design that he looks for in his art: specific and designed -- but not overtly so -- stylish, comfortable, and clean. Not very interested in narrative art, Star has much more of a minimalist sensibility: "I can appreciate a white painting." One of the reasons he is such a fan of Ruscha's is because at first glance, "the work seems very simple but as you look closely at the detail of brushstrokes and the variations of color, you see things that are not as simple as you thought." The physical interior of the house has very clean lines with no visible moldings. A lack of ornate decoration leaves the walls exposed in a way that allows one to notice the imperfections. "It is in the complication where you can hide imperfections. It's so much harder to make something simple than it is to make something complicated," says Star.
Only the creator of Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, and Sex and the City could get away with an opulent faux ostrich leather and mahogany custom-made bed. The bed is framed by a pair of panneauz de verre mahogany side tables, emebellished with hand-painted glass panels and bronze bamboo motif. A retro Delaunay cord-colored leather and chrome chair is by Minotti, behind which hangs a piece by renowned Cuban artist Enrique Celaya.
Though the house predictably has immense style, it has a lot of warmth in keeping with Star's wish that the house "feel like a home and not like a magazine layout." He thinks of it as a very comfortable, happy house. This "smart house" has great electronics built in and is exceptionally wired for music and television. Star installed a hidden projector in the living room; it was "the first thing I did in the house and it is my very favorite toy," he says. He loves watching movies there and lying on the couch in the glass walled addition, feeling surrounded by nature.
Like the rest of the residence, the new pool room addition is almost seamlessly connected to the landscape. The ironwood from the outdoor deck reaches into the room, where it meets flush with the white terrazzo floor. Floor-to-ceiling steel and glass doors slide on tracks that extend beyond the house so the room can be opened to the outdoors. Star thought the space originally intended to be his workspace was too spectacular to use as "my big messy office" He admits that his office at home (he also has one on the Sony lot) has a much different feeling than the rest of the house. It may be one of the very few places that the clean and clutter-free aspect of his modern aesthetic goes astray. The space is darker than the rest of the house and scripts pile up on his desk. Above all of the clutter and organized chaos, however, hangs a painting of a simple question mark by Ed Ruscha, perhaps reminding Star that the disorder comes and goes, no matter how much you try to keep it at bay. Wherever there's an intentionally ordered, clean surface -- minimalist at its finest -- something big and creative is lurking nearby.
Excerpted from Hip Hollywood Homes by Sue Hostetler Copyright © 2006 by Sue Hostetler. Excerpted by permission of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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