It isn’t easy to have your property turned upside down to create a guesthouse and totally redo the rest of the backyard — especially with two young kids in the household. For a Solana Beach couple, such an overhaul wasn’t their first choice, but the results were more than worth it.

“Before we started the project, we looked around the neighborhood for a full turnkey upgrade to our current house, but everything was twice the price and would still be a project,” the husband explained. “So, we decided to invest in our existing home and truly make it ours.”

The two-story, 2,500-square-foot house was built in 1960 and has four bedrooms and three bathrooms. The couple, who wished to stay anonymous, bought it in 2016, having fallen in love with its modern design and openness, not to mention the community. New zoning laws that allowed for Accessory Dwelling Units, or ADUs, meant that the family could stay put and create a guesthouse for family and friends.

“We wanted to create a space that resembled a ‘mini home’ for our guests and would allow us to spread out when needed,” he said.

The couple hired Jim Dyjak of Dyjak Design Build, who worked with D Scott Hall Designers, Kasey Doyle of Soil and Sea Landscape Design, and architect John Mills Davies. The project began in September 2020 and most of it was finished 15 months later at the end of 2021. Doyle is in the middle of re-landscaping the front yard.

The homeowners wanted the guesthouse to be open, modern, low maintenance and consistent with the existing design of the main house. They also needed an office separate from the main house that would support today’s new “work from anywhere” lifestyle.

The project wasn’t limited to the already daunting construction of a new structure. The entire backyard was re-imagined, with a pool, spa and outdoor kitchen. Previously, the rear portion of the 4,200-square-foot yard was elevated with the help of a retaining wall. There was already a covered space at the back of the house for an outdoor kitchen with a concrete pad for outdoor furniture. Along one side of the house was a spiral staircase to the second floor.

The back of the house itself was a gray stucco monolith — Dyjak said they called it the gray monster — with only the downstairs sliding door and a string of smallish windows at the top of the house to break up walls. There was plenty of grass for the now 10-year-old girl and 3-year-old boy to play on, along with old shrubbery and trees. But it was all very random.

For starters, Davies designed new siding that lined the first story of the back of the house, along with the short overhang, in tongue-and-groove Western red cedar. The cedar migrated over to the outdoor kitchen. The back of the kitchen is a wall of strips of cedar down to the Uba Tuba honed granite counters from Artistic Marble & Granite. The new extended overhang, which allows the family to relax and eat with protection from the elements, and the columns are gray stucco. The entire outdoor kitchen area now extends 23 feet to the lawn.

That concept carried over to the guesthouse. The 750-square-foot ADU has three visually distinct sections. On the left is the husband’s office, with its two exposed sides in a Santa Barbara finished medium gray stucco. The center section, which is the main living space, is faced with Western red cedar. The right section, which is the kitchen, is a darker gray stucco for contrast, said Dyjak.

Before they even got to that point, though, that elevated portion of the yard needed to be removed. Dyjak said they hauled out 100 cubic yards of dirt and had to re-grade the area. The lawn was removed, as were large palm trees and shrubs. A retaining wall was built along the back, with Soil and Sea Landscape Design constructing a 6-foot-tall, stained cedar fence on top of it as well as along the sides of the property.

The guesthouse was cleverly designed to make the most of the small footprint. The living room opens to a small galley kitchen on one side and a hallway with a stackable washer-dryer closet, a loft bedroom and bathroom.

Farther down the hall, at the end of the house is the office. Dyjak kept the design simple, clean, light and low maintenance. The Pro-Tek XL LVT flooring from Rayo Wholesale features 9-inch-wide planks and complements the light gray paint of the walls. In the kitchen are Metro by Cleaf cabinets from Imperial Custom Cabinets.

The upper cabinets in the kitchen are Talco-Total White while the bottom cabinets, as well as the bathroom vanity, are a wavy beige Pebble Beach. The kitchen counters are Della Terra quartz in Haku White from Arizona Tile, while the backsplash tiles, also from Arizona Tile, are Jumbo Hex in Cotton Glossy. The range and refrigerator are Fisher & Paykel, and a Bosch dishwasher and Frigidaire microwave round out the kitchen appliances.

The petite bathroom features a combination of Paloma Cotton Glossy Long Hex and a striking Paloma Raku in Blue Gloss by Emser Tile in the shower. The vanity is topped by the same quartz counter as in the kitchen.

The couple purchased almost all the furniture themselves from RH (formerly Restoration Hardware). In the living room is a Parisian Track sectional upholstered with a Mist-colored performance fabric in a textured linen weave. It sits with a reclaimed gray oak coffee table. Two Heston Round Side Tables in light pine and a 16-inch round light gray concrete table comprise other living room furniture. Across from the sectional is a Heston Console Table, also in light reclaimed pine, with a 72-inch-long light gray concrete top.

The bedroom has a queen-size bed, but the deep loft above, inspired by friends of the owners, contains two twin mattresses — heaven for kids. Because the space was as tight as you’d imagine on a houseboat, a small shelf was built on either side of the bed in lieu of nightstands. Recessed lighting is built in on the bottom of the loft and above the bed as well as in the ceiling over the twin mattresses. The bedding is in light colored fabrics, punctuated with navy blue and brown striped pillows.

The little house is elevated from the main yard by a few steps, but it’s at the same level as the 15-foot-by-34-foot pool next to it. Porcelain tile lines the pool, and a wall at the back of the pool with the retaining wall behind it create a super raised bed in which Doyle planted several tall, spiky aloe “Hercules.” Between them are agave “Blue Glow” and Encephalartos arenarius blue cycads, known as South African cycads. The homeowners purchased an unusual gray, oval handwoven Cayman Daybed with an open-weave canopy and sumptuous cushioning from RH that sits alongside the pool.

Instead of grass, the homeowners opted for a natural-looking artificial turf. “They have young children, and because of the proximity of the pool and water splashing, they didn’t want to have a muddy mess,” Dyjak said.

Dyjak and Doyle also created a seating area alongside the outdoor kitchen, with a concrete fire pit, surrounded by a couple of Adirondack chairs and benches.

The outdoor kitchen is an entertainer’s dream. The area had a basic gas grill but is now outfitted to the hilt, not just with a DCS built-in gas grill and a sink, but also a beer tapper, ice machine, refrigerator — also from DCS — and an Ooni pizza oven. Above the counter is a wide-screen TV. The homeowners purchased a Marbella teak sofa and a matching rectangular coffee table for the space. The family dines on the Crate and Barrel teak dining set they’d bought several years before.

“We like to entertain in a casual environment and prefer to be outside,” the husband said. “The outdoor kitchen is now the best room in the house.”

Where the spiral staircase had been, the couple had an outdoor shower built, concealed by more cedar fencing. They also added an outdoor sauna and cold plunge by the outdoor kitchen.

The hardscape — concrete pads surrounded by river rock — is complemented by a wide array of succulents, cacti and tropical plantings, strategically placed by Doyle. In front of the guesthouse is what will surely become the exterior focal point — an Euphorbia ammak, commonly called desert cactus. It’s surrounded by Sansevieria zeylanica, or bowstring hemp, zamia furfuracea Cardboard Palm, and Casuarina glauca “Cousin It.”

Across from the guesthouse and by the main house is a garden area that Doyle filled with grasses like Lomandra ‘Platinum Beauty,’ asparagus fern and Queen Emma Crinum lily, known as giant spider lily. In front of the nearby air conditioner’s condenser, Doyle planted melaleuca densaflora, which eventually will block the unit from view. A side walkway on the other side of the house has a stunning collection of plants, from the palms that are shaped to look like elegant bamboo to much smaller Philodendron Xanadu and a variety of ferns, bromeliads and succulents.

Dyjak said he was pleased at how smoothly the project was executed. He said that the client was accommodating when he and his colleagues needed something. Dyjak felt responsible with the design-build business model, and it added pressure to finish the project and keep it in budget.

“I like to think we’re in a mini marriage and we’re going in shoulder to shoulder,” he said. “My biggest compliment is that I have happy clients.”

The homeowners said they enjoyed working with Dyjak and Doyle.

“I’d like to think it was a collaborative process, but Jim and Kasey really took a rough sketch, created a 3D rendering and then agreed on a practical design that incorporated all of our best ideas,” the husband said. “Truly a team effort led by Jim. We wanted to stay informed but left all of the details in their capable hands.”

He added that the incorporation of the cedar fencing and siding really changed the feel of the property — and raved that the landscape lighting is “groovy.”

As for the guesthouse, it’s been a huge success.

“We had plenty of guests and a few small get-togethers,” the husband said. “The guesthouse has proved to be a nice way to welcome family and friends for extended periods. Plenty of privacy, space and amenities for everyone.”

Caron Golden is a freelance writer.

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