At Special Friday Preview, Pasadena Showcase House of Design Reveals Dazzling Makeover

The 2022 Pasadena Showcase House of Design home, scrubbed up and renovated for a new year, displayed its new look for showcase members on Friday.  Owned by Dr. Brian Lugo, the sprawling 10-bedroom, 12-bath, 12,260 square-foot Tudor Revival home on Oaklawn Avenue in South Pasadena—featured the work of  21 interior designers and three exterior and landscape designers.

The makeover opens to the public for touring this Sunday, April 24.

The regal 1905 mansion anchors a historic Greene & Greene planned neighborhood of century-old homes.

“This house is special to me, obviously, since I lived here,” said Lugo, “and the previous owners had always expressed to me that they would love for someone to eventually come in and restore the house to its previous luster.”

“I think people are going to be very happy with the product,” he said.

Lugo, a trauma surgeon, actually lived on the property—in the butler’s quarters for five years—before finally giving up on ever actually buying the historic home. But when the pandemic struck and nearly everything in the world changed, the owners were ready to sell, and Lugo took full advantage of the opportunity.

“This house is special to me, obviously, since I lived here,” said Lugo, “and the previous owners had always expressed to me that they would love for someone to eventually come in and restore the house to its previous luster.”

The house, which had fallen into some disrepair, was originally built for Harry Hawgood, an English civil engineer who designed railways and waterways all over the world. The home’s concrete construction bypassed popular wood framing of the time, leading many architectural observers to surmise that Hawgood himself was the architect.

The home contains rich wood interiors and intriguing period details including stained glass windows, ornate beamed ceilings, and floor-to-ceiling travertine fireplaces. Landscaped sunken gardens wrap around the home with scenic paths leading down to the hidden edges of the property.

For the Showcase project, the home was redecorated and restored from the pool house to every one of the dozen bathrooms.

The room transformations range from typical renovations with a modern update, to the quirky, as in the case of Shari Tipitch’s Kimono Pavillion, a reimagined former second-floor staircase landing. Using old-world painting skills and an eye for detail, Tipitch, a longtime Showcase House participant,  incorporated a lush theme of tigers against an Asian motif of ocean and sky into the rectangular space.

Designer James Hernandez utilized a wallpaper design of flowering vines, as a backdrop for brightly colored paintings and new window treatments in his redone sunroom.

All of the designers shared the same overall idea about their redecorated rooms—that each would serve as a “quiet place,” or a spot of respite or solitude, at the end or beginning of a busy day.

Pasadena Showcase House for the Arts, an all-volunteer, nonprofit organization, has been supporting local music and arts programs since 1948. With more than 200 members, the organization primarily raises funds from the Showcase House, which has provided more than $23 million to nonprofit organizations, in support of music education, scholarships, concerts, and music therapy.

More information about the Pasadena Showcase House of Design is available at https://pasadenashowcase.org/.