Lights,Camera ... Home!
JORDANA BREWSTER renovated a 100-year-old house as a weekend getaway for her newly blended family, then realized she never wanted to leave
Alberta Ferretti dress, earrings and rings from Roseark. Opie Tete A Tete chaise, vintage Swedish floor lamp. Hair by Clariss Rubenstein at A-Frame Agency. Makeup by Lilly Keys at A-Frame Agency.
Written by Elizabeth Varnell
Photographs by Sami Drasin
Styling by Katie Bofshever
Says Jordana Brewster of her first forays to Montecito, “I started coming here to escape. There was no one around, and I’d read and write, and there was a level of peace. It felt very rooted.” Those initial visits led Brewster and her husband, Mason Morfit, to a century-old Winsor Soule–designed house that they renovated in time to stage their rehearsal dinner underneath the venerable oak tree out front. Now the couple, who recently celebrated their first wedding anniversary, have taken up permanent residency in the labyrinthine space. “We had been here all summer,” says Brewster. “And I thought, ‘Why should we leave?’”
The Yale-educated actress began her career at 15 and made her feature film debut three years later in a Robert Rodriguez sci-fi mystery before being cast in The Fast and the Furious, the street-racing film that begot a lengthy action franchise. Her work brought her to the West Coast, but a feeling of connectedness and contentment remained elusive during the two decades she lived in Los Angeles.
“In a way, moving has allowed me to get far more focused on what I want to do.”
Brewster, who was born in Panama, moved around as a kid, relocating to London and Rio de Janeiro before landing in New York for her formative years. She says she felt at home in all those places, yet Los Angeles always felt transient. “That’s the piece I found in Montecito—that sense of home and groundedness. Nothing really gets me off balance here,” says Brewster, sitting in her sun-filled dining room, where antique-mirrored walls reflect elegant glass doors leading to a back porch. In the yard beyond, Zelda, her Spanish poodle, and Endicott, her Portuguese water dog, are sprawled in the sun.
The house was designed in 1917 by Soule, an East Coast–raised architect who studied at Harvard and MIT. It sits on almost an acre of land planted with the arching oak plus palms and citrus. “We were lucky enough to inherit original drawings,” says architect Marc Appleton, whose firm helped the couple update the property, taking cues from Soule’s initial designs. “What’s unique about this house is that it’s built in more of a French Riviera, Mediterranean style than the typical Spanish Colonial Revival approach,” he adds, noting Soule relocated to Santa Barbara in 1911, making this an early project in his decades-long career. “Jordana and Mason were enamored of and attracted to the history of the old house. We worked to refresh it and bring it up to date but at the same time respect it architecturally.”
“There was a lovely awareness of making smart changes, rather than throwing out the DNA of the house,” agrees Chloe Warner, founder of Oakland-based Redmond Aldrich Design. Although Brewster and Morfit, who is the head of a San Francisco activist investment fund, aimed to preserve the character of the rooms, they relied on a vibrant palette devised with Warner to update the interiors. For example, bold blue Portuguese tiles line the kitchen. “I love the color and how happy it is,” says Brewster, whose mother is from Portugal.
“We all worked to refresh it and bring it up to date but respect it architecturally”
The dining room is painted in a dusty blue hue, and the game room’s terra-cotta walls complement the family’s Ping-Pong table and a Fast and Furious arcade game in one corner. “What they saw is what we truly believe, that color can be uplifting, calming,” says Warner. By necessity the space is a stomping ground of sorts, where Brewster’s two young boys and Morfit’s four children can gather. “They’re blending their families, starting this new chapter together. They wanted this serene home base for their families to merge,” she adds.
Tucked away from the large common rooms, the upstairs primary bedroom includes a century-old essential: an airy sleeping porch. A double-sided chaise lounge, bathed in sunlight coming through the surrounding windows, is a favorite spot. “They’re readers, and they wanted a place where they could sit together and read,” says Warner.
Lanvin dress, Mach & Mach sandals, Carolina Herrera earrings. Formations’ Market dining table, Nicky Kehoe dining chairs, and a BDDW Captain’s mid credenza.
Brewster also records auditions in a guest room, allowing her to remain in town rather than travel. Cellar Door—a thriller with Brewster, Scott Speedman, and Laurence Fishburne—will be out later this year, and the actress is producing a film this summer. “I’m also working on writing something with my husband,” she says. “In a way, moving has allowed me to get far more focused on what I want to do.”
In all, the house offers a very personal snapshot of the couple. “Jordana brought us a wallpaper she found while shooting in Rome,” says Warner. The Tree of Life design by Arjumand’s World, the creation of Milan-based textile designer Idarica Gazzoni, adorns a lady’s lounge adjoining a powder room. A Harlan Miller painting above one of the house’s cascading staircases came from London, acquired during a Fast production. The work depicts a fictional play with the title Wherever You Are Whatever You’re Doing This One’s For You. “I love the quote there, it makes me think of Paul,” Brewster says, referring to her late Fast co-star Paul Walker. She also has an eye on works by New York painter Karyn Lyons, who portrays the heightened emotions and dreamy haze of adolescence. The canvases remind the actress of her girlhood in Manhattan. “We want things around us that mean something,” she says.
Carolina Herrera dress from Wunderkind Montecito.
Morfit found original Dr. Seuss drawings from books he’s read to his children, and those now line the living room mantel. Above the stairs is a photograph of Joatinga beach in Rio de Janeiro. “I can almost see the place where I lived,” says Brewster. Her Montecito house’s yellow front door is also an homage to Brazil. “That culture of going to the beach after school, you didn’t need the demarcation of being inside or being out in nature—you were constantly out. That’s what we have here.”
