Interior Designers Transform an Empty Garage into a Luxury Guest House

[Narrator] These three interior designers

have been asked to transform this empty garage

into a luxurious guest suite.

They have free reign to design it in any way they please.

I'm Joy and my design style

is comfortable, relaxed, and classic.

I'm Darren Jet and my design approach

is narrative driven, bold, and daring.

I'm Noz and my design style is sometimes

minimalist, zen, and very material first.

[Narrator] No clients, no budget, just blank space.

My first impressions of this garage

is that it should be torn down

but we are not going to do that.

This garage door is sad.

This would be the clear reminder no matter what you did,

no matter how many flowers and bouquets

you put in this room for your guests,

they will know with this door and this mechanism,

I'm sleeping in somebody's garage.

My first impressions of this garage

is that it's a pretty big space

and it also has some really good bones.

It's pretty raw so I think

we can have a lot of fun with it.

We are going to breathe new breath into the structure

and make it a lovely residence for grandma.

[pencil writing] [uplifting jazz music]

My vision for the space was that

it's a real mother-in-law space but a new age grandma.

Think Tina Turner who just left the Beyonce concert,

who's still feeling cozy and wants to kind of shake it up

and you know, let her family know

that grandma's still pumping, grandma's still whipping it.

For me, a luxury is having something you yourself

can use it at all times if you so choose.

I'm starting to approach this

thinking about the terminology of a body shop.

I would like for this to also be a gym.

How can we incorporate a guest room,

a gym, and a garage all in one?

As soon as I saw this garage, I was like,

I wanna do zendustrial,

which is zen and industrial, mixed together.

Industrial because it's a garage

and zen because there's gorgeous trees outside.

I wanna bring some of that beautiful peacefulness

into this garage. [calming jazz music]

So this floor is just a poured concrete floor.

You can see it's a little worse for wear,

we can do a lot better.

What we want to do in this space is

to think about indoor outdoor at all times.

At the end of the day, this is a garage.

It has to be a space that can accept an oil spill.

The car can pull in and it's not going to damage the floor.

So what I wanna do is have the floor

basically just be the driveway.

In this case, the driveway comes into the space

and instead of it just being a plain concrete,

let's do something a little bit cooler.

Let's have the concrete poured

and then have stones inside of it

that just give a little bit of texture.

I really want to lean into the idea

of a masculine focused space.

So the idea of having rocks embedded into the flooring,

that is really our first step in the process.

I personally love an epoxy floor.

First of all, it's very doable

and second of all, you can actually paint with epoxy.

You can pour it out and almost like resin,

you can rake it around and make swirly marbleized patterns.

So I wanna do something like that here,

but it's zen and so you would actually rake

two different colors of epoxy,

a lighter beige and a darker gray,

and we would rake that into the shape of a zen garden.

Grandma is this funky diva,

her best grandchild is her new Bugatti

and she wants it on full display at all times.

And we are going to paint the concrete.

It's not the most novel idea in the world,

but what is, is we're going to dig deep

so the car will be below a floor that is inset

with this transparent material

and look down at her Bugatti.

So it's going to look like it's encased in a picture frame.

We're not going to just put this thing outside.

This is an investment, an art piece

that is born to be loved.

[pencil writing] [upbeat music]

I actually want to keep the idea

of the framing in the space.

I don't really want to be rebuilding this thing at all.

I'm actually going to essentially just cover

two of the stud areas here with a darkened wood

and then adjacent to that you would have the red glass.

What I would like to do is to also have the ability

to open up those panels so that you could get some breeze in

and just make a really comfortable environment.

The overall material palette of this room

really is inspired by Teshima Art Museum in Japan.

They have the sort of darkened black wood

with glass that is tinted red.

What's really cool about that is you can see outside,

but everything turns into a sort of black shadow in a way.

The walls are just going to receive

an encaustic Venetian finish,

which is a very troweled hand with wax,

which also creates depth within the wall finish.

And then we're gonna create

this beautiful bronze inset framework

with dividers separating the private space

from the public space.

While there is nothing wrong with the door over here,

I wanna move it over to where this window is

and replace this window with like a glass door.

The only other thing I'm gonna do,

is I wanna make this window a teeny bit bigger.

You're gonna move things around architecturally,

this is the time to do it, when your space is just a shell.

Then once I've moved this over,

I'm gonna actually insulate the walls.

Going back to the zen thing, I love shoji screens.

I have a vision of us being able to use shoji screens

to actually hide this giant electrical panel,

to hide the window to do a lot of things.

And I would use kind of an oak that's similar to this,

which is very light and beautiful,

very Americana because I like oak.

Rather than using like a Hinoki cypress cedar,

which is more endemic to Japan.

This is I would say, like the Hinoki of America

so we're gonna do white oak

all over the place for the frames.

[pencil writing] [upbeat chillstep music]

I really love the existing beams

and I wanted them to remain because I think they're

a nice little architectural application.

What a lovely opportunity to have a vaulted ceiling.

Why spend extra money when you don't have to?

So just adding a really rich, deep dark stain to them

I think is a nice contrast to the Venetian walls.

The space itself is very cool

from a geometric perspective.

Cathedral ceiling, the sort of a-frame

that lives on top of the rectangle.

So what I would like to do is to just embrace that.

Why don't we just carry that same materiality

up from the walls onto the ceilings?

So wherever you have a wood wall will be a wood ceiling

and wherever you have the red glass wall

will be a red glass ceiling.

I love these rafters.

This is a beautiful thing if you want them,

but I kind of love the idea of having all of the structure

for the garage roof actually go outside.

So you don't need rafters like this

or to keep the center beam because that's beautiful

and it's gonna hold the ceiling up.

And then I wanna put skylights in

because I want there to be an opportunity for you

to cover all of the garage windows and doors up

in order to have privacy.

You still might want like natural light to flow in.

So let's take the shoji screens up

onto the vaulted ceiling of the garage

and then have skylights overhead, like how darling.

[pencil writing] [upbeat music]

So now let's address the garage door in the room.

I was gonna say the elephant, but it's a garage door.

I really don't like this one.

If we're using this as a living space,

a standard garage door is not gonna cut it

Again, the goal was really

to create a residential feel to this garage.

First thing we gotta do is we gotta get rid

of this hideous standard garage door.

The original door location in this garage

was actually dead center of the space.

But in effort for the parking garage

to be approached the way I needed it to be,

I relocated the doors from the front of the garage

to the side of the garage.

So a nice way to create that residential feel,

is to work with residential sort of styled doors,

but make 'em fabulous.

You know, get a nice finish to them

and eliminate any of that tinny aluminum feel.

We're gonna make it glass and steel

because that makes it much lighter and more beautiful.

There's this architect Olson Kundig,

they make the most spectacular garage door walls,

very refined industrial inspiration

for a lot of what's going on here,

where they'll have like a giant wheel

and then a tiny wheel where you turn the tiny wheel

and that moves the door open.

Obviously, I'll also have a button where you can press it

and it automatically opens because who wants to sit there

and you're like, Oh my god, like I'm still

outside of my car like turning my wheel.

But now let's address that I just put a glass garage door

in a place that's supposed to also be

a private guest area, right?

Fritted glass, that is my answer.

It's basically electrified glass where it's clear

until you press a switch

and then it turns frosted for privacy.

It's such a brilliant invention

and that film is going to make all the difference

in allowing guests as well as your own self,

to see out into the beautiful trees in this neighborhood

or have the privacy that you need when you're staying.

First of all, imagine this wall is being all mirror.

That would be great to make this sort of darker space

feel a bit larger and also if it's a gym,

you want to have a mirror across from you

while you're working out.

But what I would like to do

is to have one section of that mirror

be stationary as a wall

and the other part be a movable door.

It's also mirror but it opens up to the left

and that's whenever you would have your car coming in

and you have a mirrored sliding garage door.

[pencil writing] [lo-fi music]

So now let's actually like put some function in here.

We need a little kitchenette,

I think that's really important.

Even if you go into the main house

for like the shower and the toilet,

you always wanna have a sink.

So the cabinetry itself is gonna be wood,

the same oak but a touch lighter

than the rest of the oak on the shoji screen frames.

And then for the countertop,

I am envisioning Lemurian granite,

it's mostly 'cause I love holograms and I love like rainbow.

Lemurian granite almost looks like labradorite

if you're a rock hound.

And basically it's got these iridescent crystal chunks

but otherwise is mostly like a dark gray neutral.

I am seeing like a slab counter

that becomes the sink as well.

And then we'll have a side splash and a back splash

to protect the shoji screens from getting wet,

of course, we have to be practical.

And then the whole thing flows into a giant bolder,

[Noz exclaims] so I love the idea.

I don't know if folks know this,

you know you can go to a slab yard

and special order boulders?

I'm envisioning someone just really loving rocks as do I.

And then we're gonna have like a little mini fridge.

At the very very front of the space,

we have two wonderful vintage

lounge daybeds from Jean Prouvé.

We have some additional side tables from Cedric Hartman,

which have a lovely sleigh leg base to them

which are bronze finish.

The bed design is very intentional.

It's based on a reference from the 1970s

stainless steel bed frame with leather bedding on top of it.

And it's actually held up by four pulleys on the corners

with eight wires hanging from them.

These are cables that can go around the pulley

and it can be lifted up from the ground

whenever you want to have a car inside of the garage.

So for this guest bedroom purpose,

I would really like for the bed to not just be a bed.

I think that if we can pull up

a really cool chair next to it,

have a sort of coffee table moment,

the bed can also be like a day bed or like a sofa.

Where it's not just a bed hanging out

in the middle of the space,

it's actually a really cool thing

to sit on and use, and other things.

This particular lounge chair is actually by Roger Tallon.

It's a sort of egg crate foam material

with a nice stainless steel base.

It's a beautiful tension between the stainless steel

and the reclaimed wood and the red glass.

And then we'll have a glass table next to that

to really emphasize the materiality of the floor.

I always like to use round dining tables

because I detest any sense of hierarchy at the dining table.

Want everybody to be on even keel.

We have a beautiful wood dining table

from Gallery Studio.

The rattan dining chairs are from Our House

and I just really love this sort of

sculptural edge profile to them

and I thought the finish goes really, really well

with the vaulted stain on the ceiling.

When you are able to pull a pallet together of materials

that have a sense of commonality and reference,

it makes things feel like they belong together.

The reason I wanna move the door

all the way to the other wall

is because all of the rest of the function

that gets built in, is on this wall next to the kitchenette.

I want to do as little built in

on the other side of the garage

to allow for maximum square footage,

so all of the function lives only on one wall.

So we're gonna have the Murphy bed of course

because you can't just have the bed living out there

and that is gonna be in all wood.

Next to it, we'll have like storage and a little desk

'cause it's still a garage.

You still have to have somewhere for you to put

all your extra Windex, and all your extra paper towels,

and your toilet paper like somewhere you need storage still.

So we're gonna have storage

and then the little desk area is for guests

and that'll have the same countertop as the kitchenette.

The sleigh bed is from Dmitriy & Co

and it's got that sort of swoopy,

sensual edge detail to it of the framework.

The side tables are a combination of wood and plexiglass

so they feel very, very light

and almost disappear against the bed.

I really like the idea

of there being real furniture in here,

but all generally small enough or on wheels

that you can move it out of the way

when you're parking your car here.

Most of the time this garage is gonna be a garage for a car.

I don't want the furniture to be super precious

but I still want it to be chic and amazing.

I'm really in love with the Ekström sofa,

but they have a version that is on casters

and I love the idea that the biggest piece of furniture,

you're just gonna like roll it out.

And I'm gonna upholster the cushions in this beautiful

indoor-outdoor fabric.

It's designed by Kelly Wearstler for Lee Jofa,

it's actually really soft and squishy.

If you could feel it,

it's almost got kind of like a happy terrycloth vibe

and I love the indigo colors.

So we have Vonnegut Kraft, a beautiful furniture maker.

I'm gonna do their Mesa Coffee Table.

And then they also have this little stool

that kind of almost has like a torii gate

sort of swoopy seat on it.

And then I recently found this adorable,

beautiful spectacularly weirdo chair by Studio Sam Klemick.

I just love everything about it

and it's actually upholstered just like this.

Like I didn't custom change the upholstery or anything,

I actually really like it as is.

It feels very like Japanese inspired

and I love the idea of doing like indigo's and bricky reds

to sort of warm up and otherwise really neutral space.

[lively jazz music] [pencil writing]

I think in general the lighting

is going to mostly be coming from the windows,

but you know you're also gonna be using the space

at nighttime too if it is a guest room, right?

What I would like to do,

is wherever you have the wooden walls

to have integrated lighting on the floor

that would wash up the wall

and just make the room feel brighter,

while also still casting a very strong cone of light

and being a bit dramatic.

You also wanna have lighting from the ceiling as well.

So just having very simple spotlights

on the bottom of each beam, on the left and right side

will help you out there.

Let's talk overhead first.

I've removed all of the structure in the ceiling

and now I have this like gaping vaulted ceiling.

I did that because I want to have a giant light fixture.

Just because it's a garage doesn't mean

that you can't have luxury.

I'm really in love with Jeff Zimmerman's pieces

who makes basically illuminated sculptures,

fancy artistic word for lights.

And there's this one which is kind of like swoopy

and looks like a tree branch

that has blossoms coming off of it.

It's giving that organic nature tone to the space

that otherwise is very rectilinear,

so I love the idea of one of those

in kind of a bronze, dark black finish.

Coming out of this black painted beam

and filling the room with a beautiful soft glowy light.

We have a recess with very warm lighting

and also storage units for all of her little bits and such.

And it feels like a gallery space when she's sitting there

reclining on the Jean Prouvé daybeds or just entertaining.

And as we're moving to the dining area,

there's this really delicate sort of

leaf-like verdigris chandelier from Cox London,

which is really just very light, not heavy in the space

and it kind of brings the greenery in

without having to maintain plants

'cause she's traveling all the time.

So it sort of has a nice naturalistic vibe to that space.

So we've just got little, you know,

lights from Lulu and Georgia

because you know you gotta read something

and grandma's gotta lay there

and figure out the destination for her next trips.

Just next to the window,

you still need light over the countertop.

I just want everything to kind of be vibey, right?

So I wanna use this ochre piece,

it's actually already part wood

and then there's this beautiful giant glass lens on it

where an LED shines all the way through the glass,

and then the bottom of the glass becomes what lights up.

It's kind of wild, it looks magical.

At the bed, there are these amazing sconces

designed by Sarah Schoenberger

and I just think they're so ridiculous.

They go like this and they're just...

They're mostly just really thin.

I've never seen a hard wire light

that has such a slim profile.

So it's perfect for us to put along the frames

of the Murphy bed so the lights do stick out

'cause they're sitting vertically perpendicular

to the rest of the Murphy bed frame.

So we're gonna put them on hinges

and then you could fold them in against the Murphy bed

when it wasn't in use.

[pencil writing] [calming lo-fi music]

So now let's talk about plants.

This is still a zen garden inspired space

so I really love bonsai trees in here.

If you look up, are bonsai trees indoor or outdoor plants?

Yes, I am equally as confused.

It's yes and yes, so I love the idea

of having a really big, tall Japanese black pine.

It's my favorite bonsai plant

and they can grow in the United States.

I'm gonna have one over here that kind of further disguises

this whole shoji screen covering up

the electrical panel situation and that one is on casters.

When this is a garage-garage,

that tree lives outside principally so it gets fresh air,

it gets precipitation, it gets sunshine,

and it continues to grow into a large bonsai.

And then it comes inside when you have guests,

so it's like a little lovely organic moment.

And then over on the giant boulder,

we're gonna have more of a traditional little bonsai

and that one lives in a pot that you can carry around.

So this one is the indoor plant,

but I did wanna make that window larger

so that you can have plenty of light shining down

onto that little baby bonsai.

In this space, I want to keep

the decorative elements to a minimum.

Of course we're gonna have a plant,

I want to have something that's a bit more sculptural.

So in this case, having more of a cactus.

And really I want to let the architecture speak for itself

and I want to let the user also take precedence.

I want the car to take precedence when it's inside of here.

I don't wanna have too many things going on.

I want it to be very architectural

and simple at the end of the day.

And then we've got some beautiful

contemporary artwork by Michael Dawkins

and the decorative mirror directly above is from Perigold

and it's like so inexpensive.

And the architecture in this room,

really just kind of riffs off one another

and it just creates a nice balance within the space.

[pencil writing] [lively chillhop music]

The warm gallery, artistic sort of vibe

for today's grandma's was nailed here.

I mean, it's an upbeat space,

artistic space, comfortable space.

Grandma clearly loves to entertain.

She's paying homage to her Bugatti

that she worked her tail off for,

and wants everybody to see it.

So you know, cue the music.

I think this room is really sick.

I think that as a guest room, it's kind of a gag.

I think it's actually very cool.

I don't think there's anything to shy away from.

There's something cool about showcasing your life to people.

So if your in-laws are staying here,

they know who you are and they're gonna love it.

They love you and you're welcoming them into your home

so let them sleep on a leather bed,

suspend it from the ceiling

and they're gonna remember it forever.

I am so happy with the end result.

I would be really proud personally

to have guests in a space like this,

especially because it's so indoor-outdoor.

[pencil writing] [cheery jazz music]

Whoa!

Nelly! Okay, S&M fantasia.

Sex dome. Wow!

That's a sex dome!

Look at her, this is amazing.

Wow, I love...

I love all of this red of course.

I'm absolutely fond of. Wow, that's so cool.

Wait but it's also a gym though, right?

It's a gym, yeah. I love...

[Darren] Wait, that's funny. Yeah.

[Joy] That's a very sexy room.

I mean, I was thinking like, you know the ultimate luxury

is to have something that you can use sort of all the time.

Yeah, hundred percent.

It's not just a guest room

so I also had this thought of like a body shop.

Oh cool. Kind of a play-

What kind of body shop? Right...

[everyone laughs]

What kind of a body shop? I like that, that's amazing.

But your bed goes up-up? It goes up-up.

So mine folds up, it's just a Murphy bed.

[Darren] And your garage door

is the glass door right there?

[Noz] It's this giant glass door

and then it has glass door switch,

you know the thing where then all of a sudden the window-

[Joy] Fretted glass for privacy.

Thank you,

that's what it's called. Yeah.

I am needing Joy all the time to remember my words.

Joy, yours is really giving like luxury bedroom too.

It's so beautiful.

It does not even look like a garage

[Joy] Dance party at seven. Yeah.

Cause she's a little older

so it needs to start a little earlier.

I feel that, I feel that.

There's definitely dancing.

Mine goes all night. [everyone laughs]

With your workout party.

Exactly.

[inspiring music]