Rancho Santa Fe

Home Renovation Design

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Rancho Santa Fe, CALIFORNIA Home Renovation Design

  • Architect: N/A
  • Contractor: Mulvey Builders
  • Location: Rancho Santa Fe, CA
  • Photography by: Ryan Garvin Photography

In this Rancho Santa Fe home renovation design, Jill Shevlin Design transformed a longtime client’s new home into a modern and sunny Spanish-meets-California oasis. The project was tackled mostly from scratch, as the owners sold their previous home furnished — save for a few special pieces — as part of a cross-country move from New York to California.

This Rancho Santa Fe home renovation was a brilliant case study in virtual interior design — the majority of the project was executed remotely from Jill Shevlin Design’s base in Vero Beach, Florida.

The unique challenge here involved marrying the modern farmhouse aesthetic the owners loved from their previous home in New York with a mixed-traditional Spanish-meets-California style in the new one. To achieve a look the owners would love, the home renovation design included the following: 


  • Designing the formal living room
  • Creating a welcoming and beautiful entryway
  • Incorporating an art deco buffet from the previous home into the dining room
  • Renovating the family room fireplace
  • Adding new floors, upper cabinets, and a new table into the kitchen
  • Installing custom cabinetry, marble floors and a free-standing pedestal tub to transform a dark and dated bathroom into a master bath suite retreat.

Countless creative touches were featured in this home renovation, such as a fireplace renovation that turned the California home’s original mixed-material firebox into a gorgeous mantle and hearth made by a local concrete fabricator. 


The living room is stunning, with comfortable and homey elements that prioritize function and fit the owners’ laidback California lifestyle. It’s the perfect space for relaxing after work and entertaining guests. Jill also decorated the room with four-legged friends in mind — the indoor-outdoor chocolate fabric cleverly hides paw prints and fur. 


And the most ingenious part of the room: the television is not the focal piece. Jill inventively modified a beautiful antique screen to hide the TV when not in use. The result is a lovely ornamental wall decoration that easily masks the TV for formal entertaining. 


The Rancho Santa Fe renovation design extended outdoors, too, with facelifts to the yard, garden, and pool, and an addition of a small wine house. The wine house was a duplicate of the couple’s cellar from New York, and retrofitted with antique Asian doors. This project is an excellent example of successful interior design from afar.


Blog Post: Designer in Reno Story

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