Unmistakably Palm Beach, with touches of Moroccan romance, Persian exoticism, tropical Jazz Age panache and 1950s swank. It was a potent design brief that could only come from clients with a deep passion for Palm Beach. Both homeowners had grown up spending time on the island, each treasuring their early memories as well as the area’s distinctive worldly and historic design vernacular. “They wanted timelessness—and a sense of romance, no matter what,” designer Marshall Watson recalls. “They wanted a house that harkens to a lifestyle that means a lot to them, one they hope to share with their children and grandchildren.”
Where some might see the faux Mediterranean 1980s home the couple purchased as a non sequitur for crafting this narrative, Watson—along with firm partner Kate Reid, architect Mark Marsh, project manager Amadou Dial of Woolems, Inc, and landscape architect Mario Nievera—saw only promise. And so began an ambitious renovation aimed at fashioning a soulful family home that gracefully mingles with the neighboring Addison Mizner-era estates the longtime clients so adore.
“The house is welcoming and relaxed, but there’s a magical aspect to everything.”
–KATE REID
“We wanted to create more of a Venetian Mediterranean look, as opposed to primitive Spanish Mediterranean,” Marsh explains. Through the addition of larger repositioned windows and doors, new Venetian-style archways and thoughtfully realigned columns, the design was transformed. “We created a much more handsome fenestration,” he continues. Within, the architect collaborated closely with the team on changes large and small, from the kitchen—which was fit with clear cypress cabinetry, a generous banquette and an intricate, Moroccan-inspired case opening—to the foyer, where they lifted the ceilings for a gracious welcome. Perhaps the greatest evolution: an outdoor gathering space crafted as an homage to the husband’s late aunt—a re-creation of her games room. Formerly an interior space, the team opened it up to the gardens, trimming the architectural canvas with coral stone walls, a pecky cypress ceiling and pistachio green shutters.