When Jason Schwartzman visited his Los Angeles home for the first time, he knew he wanted to buy it after thinking: It’s not haunted. “My way of articulating is odd,” he says, laughing, while sitting on the couch with his wife Brady Cunningham. “But there wasn’t a place in the house where I felt, ‘Oh, I don’t want to be in this weird corner.’ To me, that was the one thing that stood out: there wasn’t any place where I felt afraid.”
The mid-century modern property, originally built in 1964, is perched high on a hill in Studio City. From the outside, on a clear day, you can see all the way across the San Fernando Valley. Inside, however, you’ll find a variety of more unexpected oddities: a sitar lays across an entryway bench, while a credenza is lined with figurines gifted to the couple by Wes Anderson. (One of them is the Fantastic Mr. Fox, the titular character of Anderson’s stop-motion film voiced by Schwartzman.)
There are very few walls and doors—an open floorplan is a characteristic of the mid-century architectural style, after all—and those that do exist are far from traditional. The bedrooms, for example, feature saloon doors that you can swing open at will. “I feel like my kids can hear me if I have a question,” Schwartzman says.
Yet, “it has its nooks,” he adds. One of them? A den that’s almost entirely filled with a giant checkered sofa. Cunningham, an interior designer and founder of creative consulting firm Wall for Apricots, designed the nine-foot-deep piece herself. “It’s like a clubhouse,” she says of the room, where their three children often have movie nights. “Our kids will have friends over, and they’ll all find a way to fit on it.”
Hidden in the drawers beneath? Arts and crafts supplies—which are just as much for the kids as they are for Schwartzman, she notes.
In fact, much of the furniture was custom-made by Cunningham, including their walnut dining room table and a yellow console in the bedroom inspired by a grand piano. The Marzipan Pianette—a credenza that opens up to reveal a 1970s Hohner Clavinet Pianet hidden underneath—was the joint brainchild of Cunningham and the music-loving Schwartzman. If a piece of furniture is by another designer, Cunningham often gives it her signature spin: a Nicoletti Salotti couch, for example, is reupholstered in a floral print. “We both love finding old things and updating them,” she says.
When she began decorating the house, Cunningham felt drawn to pastels, and so many of the rooms now glow with rich peaches and yellows. “Mid-century homes, with their hard floors and glass, can feel very cold, so I wanted to really lean into warm colors,” she explains.
Schwartzman played a more impromptu role in the interior design scheme: walk into their guest bathroom, and you’ll see he’s doodled all over the wall. Several of his paintings are hung throughout, and he’s also made sure there’s always an instrument within arms reach. (In addition to that sitar and pianette, you’ll find guitars, a grand piano, drums, and a ukulele.) He says that Cunningham encourages his creativity but thankfully puts a limit on it: when he wanted to turn their rock chimney into a climbing wall, she gently vetoed the idea out of safety concerns. “They’re all really fun ideas! But realistically…” Cunningham trails off.
“She’s keeping this from descending into Pee-wee’s Playhouse territory,” Schwartzman adds, laughing.
A few years ago, the couple briefly considered moving. The house originally only had two bedrooms, and after welcoming their third child, they wondered if they’d outgrown the space. For months, Schwartzman and Cunningham looked at dozens and dozens of houses across Los Angeles. But every time, they came to the same conclusion: “We didn’t want to leave,” says Cunningham.
That was partly due to its architectural pedigree: mid-century modern houses are in hot demand in L.A. (“It’s really hard to find beautiful homes like this on this market,” Cunningham says.) But most of all, it’s the emotional ties that have kept them here.
It was 2008 when a newly-engaged Schwartzman and Cunningham decided to move from New York to Los Angeles. They’d been living in a tiny 600-foot square foot apartment. One night, after taking a long transcontinental flight, they ascended Laurel Canyon Boulevard and into the Santa Monica Mountains with a real estate agent to visit the house for the first time. “We could see these really tall windows illuminated, and it had this unmistakable charm,” says Cunningham. “It was so exciting that maybe we could afford something like this.”
A year later, after having purchased their first home together, the couple secretly wed in their backyard with only their closest family and friends in attendance. They covered their pool to make a de facto aisle, and a band played in the corner. “We are super sentimental about this house,” Cunningham adds.
Now that the extensive, multi-year renovation they began in 2021 is complete, they plan to stay put for as long as possible as their children grow into young adulthood. There may be no need for a rock climbing wall, but the two say they will continue adding and tweaking the home to fit whatever needs (or zany wants) arise.
“I like to see how it changes with us in it,” adds Schwartzman. “It’s like a cook tasting as you go.”
