in 2006 furniture and textile designer tanya aguiniga moved to this charming little LA bungalow with her husband and sister in search of off-street parking and a studio space. the location is great in a quiet, tree-lined section of LA, nestled between silverlake and glendale, where they have views of endless mountains and wonderful galleries, independent shops and restaurants nearby. here at d*s we’re huge fans of tanya’s designs, so it’s so wonderful to see her furniture put to good use in her own home. be sure to check out her latest designs on her website which are wonderfully innovative, yet practical, and i can’t wait to see more illustrations to come from her sister. for additional and images of this adorable home, click here. [thanks, tanya!] -anne
CLICK HERE for Tanya’s full sneak peek after the jump! (please note: you do not have to click all of the thumbnails above to see full-sized images. just be sure to the red “click here” link above or any “read more” link to see the full post and all the pictures at once)
Todd and I have been collecting mid-century furniture for the last 12 years, and the house is decorated with thrift store finds from around the country, some of the furniture that I have made and some crafts I’ve picked up on travels. The brown sofa is a Florence Knoll piece that I rescued from the dumpster behind the Museum I used to work at that we had re-upholstered. Most of the tapestries in the house are from Teotitlan del Valle in Oaxaca, Mexico, which I purchased from the family I stayed with to study natural wool dying techniques. The small wool animals scattered around the house (18 total) are from Chiapas, and are all made by different women using loom woven scraps. The pups are Mexican street-rescued lovelies: Rocky and Juliette, our babies.
The 6 foot tall cut-out mirror next to our computer desk was also a dumpster find. It was part of an installation at the RISD Museum that was tossed and has now traveled with us cross country.
The kitchen is rather small so we ended up with a tiny refrigerator in order to fit the dining set I had made for our previous apartment. The dining set is steel and walnut ply, and I made it with picnic tables in mind. Our dinnerware collection is what really set the tone for the rest of the kitchen. My favorite pieces are the Block Chromatics set, which are vintage color coordinated sets from Germany that we had been amassing. In this mix are also some Denby Chevron dishes, Eva Zeisel and Tapio Wirkkala.
Our bed is a piece that I made for Todd’s birthday a few years back. The rest of our bedroom furniture is vintage Vista of California, same as our living room credenza and computers desk. The animal pieces in the room are mostly Mexican crafts from Chiapas, Oaxaca and Alaska.
The amazing large deer is carved from a single piece of wood and was made by Vicente Hernandez Vasquez in the town of San Martin Ticajete, Mexico – a town whose residents dedicate themselves to making hand carved and intricately painted imaginary animals. The ceramics here and throughout the house are vintage mixed in with pieces made by friends, Adam Silverman’s Atwater Pottery pieces being our favorites. The large photographs where shot by Ellen Vanderlaan while at RISD, before she went on to start BAGGU.
These little guys are paper mache masks from Chiapas and the walrus is from my latest trip to Alaska. He’s wood, ivory and wolf ruff, made in the scrimshaw tradition but lovingly done with a Sharpie instead by the elder Alaskan artist Henry Shavings. I almost left it because it had a broken tusk, by Henry told me that walruses often break their tusks climbing up rocks, and with that story, I knew it had to come home with me.
This was my birthday present from my sister this year. They represent me (the pink one) and my 2 younger sisters. My sister Karla (the blue one) is the loveliest girl I know and she also happens to be a wonderful budding illustrator. She was too shy to share her room which is full of her beautiful illustrations and has bunk beds to accommodate the endless amounts of visitors we get.
As a furniture maker, I really needed a private space to make large works, and had been having a hard time finding a coop shop space. Luckily we found a house that had a space that had been converted into an office/studio, and although making furniture at home is not the easiest thing to manage, it’s worked well for the past 3 years. Since I do all of my own design and labor I have a fully portable woodshop and metal shop that I set up outside. It gets stored away in our shed when not in use. The inside of the studio is used mostly for clean work, felting, sewing, jewelry and designing. California weather makes it really easy to work outside for most of the year. I really only need to worry about being out in the sun all day, which is why I work on furniture under a canopy. The inside of the studio is a little crazy, but that’s how I like it. I’m really into color and textures. I tend to surround myself with materials that inspire me rather than objects. I find the compositions created by their colors and their raw potential rather intriguing. The space is divided into a design/layout station, a sewing station, jewelry station and an illustration section for my sister (which doubled up as a music recording station for Todd).
