Today, AD is welcomed by Jennifer Garner to tour her farm-style home in Los Angeles. When designing Garner’s home, there was no Pinterest board or pictures from a magazine; it was simply an in-depth discussion with designers Steve and Brooke Giannetti and a watercolor painting of their vision. Together, they designed a farmhouse-style oasis full of warmth and character. From her wooden kitchen with a dedicated baking station to an orchard in the backyard, it’s easy to forget Garner lives among the hustle and bustle of LA. “I wanted it to feel old and cool and historic, but I also wanted to make it work for a big family with a lot of things going on.”
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00AD, hello. Come on in. It's the cleanest it'll ever be.
00:17So this is the biggest room in the house. This is the living room.
00:20And I wanted it to feel really expansive so somebody could be playing Rummikub over there.
00:24That's really the Rummikub table. And people could be sitting around the fire here.
00:28You know how you just imagine it and then someday you have a perfect moment where it actually comes true?
00:34That is like a kind of moment.
00:36Steve and Brooke Giannetti and I have worked together for a long time.
00:40And I sat down with them one time and said,
00:43Okay, I know exactly the house I want to build. And I described it to them.
00:46Steve sent me a watercolor of it. And that is exactly the house we built.
00:51We so didn't change much that I started panicking in the middle of the build.
00:55And I thought, I never even made a Pinterest board. I never even showed him pictures from a magazine.
01:00I just told him what I wanted and he did it. And what if I hate it?
01:03But it turns out I'm really, really happy.
01:05The paintings are both by Reiner Andriessen. This is Victor Garber's husband.
01:09And in that one, there's a little photograph of Victor and me painted into the painting.
01:14And so it's extra special, dear, to me.
01:16This is by Reed Bradley at Judson Studios.
01:19He is the son of a friend of mine, Marla Frazee. She's my favorite children's book author.
01:24I wanted it to be evocative of spring in West Virginia.
01:27And you see, like, the morning glories coming down and a little bit of the mountains in the distance.
01:33A special feature, especially in the summer, is having these doors all the way wide open.
01:38Here we have it. Indoor, outdoor.
01:40This isn't California. I don't know what is.
01:42The only problem is, if my kids are having their class pool party here or something,
01:47it's very hard to keep wet kids out of the house.
01:50I have to really just stand guard and say, get away.
01:54I'll look over and there'll be two wet teenagers playing the piano.
01:57And I'm just like, okay, don't look, don't look.
02:03I'm so excited to show you my kitchen because since the day I moved in,
02:06this is the first time ever that the counter's been cleaned.
02:09Look, it's never going to look like this again. Please memorialize this.
02:13I love a wood kitchen. So the house really is like being inside a tree house.
02:19Here alone with my kids on a weekend, I cannot tell you how often I make something
02:25and I'm just feeding them as it comes off the stove
02:28because I'm not very good at things coming out of the oven or off the stove at the same time.
02:32So it is just like, have your vegetables, now have your this, now have your that.
02:36It's all out of order, but they don't seem to mind.
02:38So I knew when I imagined my favorite kitchen ever in my mind
02:43that it would have an area dedicated to baking.
02:45It just makes it so much easier to have it all in one place
02:48and to know where your different flowers are and your chocolate chips.
02:51Chocolate chips are the most important thing in the whole house
02:54and I could tell you where they are.
02:56All my fireplace grates are done by Wallace Metalworks.
02:59Usually there's a dog sleeping under here.
03:01It just adds so much coziness.
03:04It's unbelievable how nice it is to have a little bit of fire going in your kitchen.
03:12This is the dining room.
03:13When I first moved to LA, I made friends with a photographer named Laura Porzak
03:18and she turned into this incredible fine arts photographer.
03:21Clearly I'm a fan of her stuff because this is all Porzak.
03:24Brooke Gianetti and I had a blast looking at light fixtures.
03:29I can never figure out dining room lights,
03:31but you know what, you live with the choices you make and I think I'm good with it.
03:35We really eat at home almost all the time
03:38and we eat in here pretty regularly
03:40and I put doors on this room so that it could be a meeting room
03:45and actually I have a lot of meetings in here.
03:47I work from home if I'm not on set.
03:51So the first room I described to Steve,
03:54I said I want a library that is a super awesome cozy up with everyone TV room
04:00and I want it to be like a deep gray blue.
04:02This is what he did and I think he kind of nailed it.
04:05When we were first envisioning the room,
04:07I said I know the couch I want but it's a BBDW couch
04:10and this is it and it's comfortable and I just like the look of it.
04:13It's just pretty.
04:14This is everyone's favorite place.
04:16You just don't need some huge old screening room.
04:19We're pretty happy just being right in here.
04:21Feet go anywhere.
04:23I am so not fussy.
04:24There are feet, there are dogs, there are shoes.
04:26If you're going to build a house, you have to live in it.
04:29If we were going to have a library, I wanted it to be still light
04:33so it opens all the way and then it can go straight out to the garden.
04:38Here's our fireplace and this is our clover
04:43because it's supposed to be good for the earth.
04:45It's so easy.
04:46We just threw down seeds and I just think it's cheerful.
04:49I have an owl box and I'm waiting for an owl to discover it.
04:56Look, my very first cherry ever.
04:59Oh my gosh.
05:02This is my little orchard.
05:03I love it so much.
05:05We have apricots, figs and cherries right here.
05:08And then we have peaches, nectarines, apples
05:11and they are all fed by greywater
05:13because water is hard to come by in California
05:16and I don't want to use more than my share.
05:18So the greywater system, it's a big tank
05:20and it collects all the water from the washing machine, the dishwasher
05:24and filters it and waters very specifically what you tell it to water.
05:27But there's a lot of phosphorus in greywater for some reason
05:30and I guess fruit trees thrive on it.
05:33So we just said, add more fruit trees.
05:35I love that you can come out here in the middle of the summer and find a snack.
05:38Growing up the daughter of a farmer
05:40and having such connections to my family farm,
05:43it just truly thrills me.
05:45So pretty much everything here is edible.
05:48All of the bushes are blueberry bushes
05:50and actually I'm going to get you a blueberry.
05:51I see one.
05:52Here you go.
05:54You want to see my vegetable house?
05:55It's so cute.
05:58I'm all about herbs.
06:00Mostly I want thyme.
06:02I cannot grow enough.
06:04My kids and I love kale chips,
06:06so we always have a lot of kale.
06:08It's tomato season, it's green bean season
06:10and then just natural flowers that pests don't like
06:13because, you know, you got to be organic.
06:17This is my favorite spot to sit.
06:19Well, I have different favorite spots.
06:21I sit in this little house behind us
06:24in the morning with coffee.
06:26Here, I'll act it out for you.
06:30Isn't it so nice?
06:32And then if it's nighttime and I have friends over,
06:35I'll show you.
06:37This is where we like to be.
06:39We turn heaters on, fire, blankets, cozy.
06:44We do have a bird's nest in the passion fruit vine right here.
06:48Oh, it got torn up.
06:50Oh, R.I.P.
06:51Okay, let's go upstairs.
06:56This is the landing at the top of the stairs.
06:59We have here some fish.
07:01My kids for Mother's Day many years ago
07:04gave me an empty little fish tank,
07:06which was basically their way of saying,
07:08please go buy saltwater fish.
07:10But you can just sit and watch their personalities forever.
07:14Kids need a spot to study.
07:16You just need a place to spread out and do projects.
07:18So that is this table.
07:21This reading nook is maybe my favorite space in the house.
07:25You can peek in on the fish.
07:27It has all the kids' books.
07:29It has this awesome stained glass of a big old oak
07:33with three little owls and Birdie looking up at them.
07:36And there was one magical night
07:38where exactly what I hoped for happened.
07:40And all three kids were piled in here with me
07:42and we pulled down all the books from when they were little
07:45and we read them one after the other.
07:47That's really awesome.
07:49That's really all I could hope for.
07:50All of us are readers,
07:52and if you're building your own house,
07:54you might as well offer people
07:56as many great places to read as possible.
08:04Welcome to my bedroom.
08:06This is T-Bear.
08:07My dad gave him to me when I was three
08:09from the Sears catalog.
08:10My mom made him some overalls.
08:12I knew I just wanted something that felt tight, compact.
08:16It was not a space that I needed a ton of room devoted to.
08:19Do you like it, T-Bear?
08:20Yeah, T-Bear likes it.
08:21I love that I can open these doors at night
08:25and wake up to birds.
08:26So I didn't need a huge bedroom.
08:29I did want a large bathroom
08:31because so often we get ready for work at home
08:35and it's always, you know, in your own bathroom
08:38and you need space for everyone to be comfortable.
08:42I wanted my bathroom to be really neutral,
08:45really calming.
08:46We wanted a kind of white that was flattering
08:49to have light bounce off of.
08:51I also wanted the house to look like
08:54an old farmhouse next to an old barn.
08:57And this is obviously the barn part
08:59because you can see the barn window.
09:02So this is where I sit
09:04and they turn me from one old gal to another.
09:10This bathtub, I love being next to the window.
09:14I love the quiet.
09:16I love having a tree in my bathroom.
09:18I'm very lucky.
09:22This is like a dream come true room for me
09:25because I love to have kids over for a slumber party
09:30but I'm also a stickler about sleep.
09:32Although sometimes there are kids literally everywhere.
09:35We wanted built-in bunks
09:38where kids could cozy up all in one together
09:41which is usually what happens late at night.
09:43You'll see them all bent over
09:45something that they're looking at together.
09:47They're all in this bunk watching something on TV.
09:50I love that the beds all have their own.
09:55Just like you're on a ship, a really nice ship.
09:58I love having a spot that is just where kids can be kids.
10:02I also keep all of their favorite, favorite toys
10:05from when they were really little.
10:06You want little kids who come over to feel welcome and excited
10:10and every now and then the big kids
10:12will still pull out the old toys and play.
10:16You know, who doesn't want to put the money in the piggy bank?
10:20If you'd like me to ring up your groceries.
10:24Oh, that's where Banana Grahams is.
10:29We're big Harry Potter fans
10:30and what are you going to do
10:31if you have a little cabinet under the stairs?
10:33You have to use it.
10:34So it became my son's office.
10:37Just a little spot for him to come in and dream.
10:40Mostly he hides from me and eats candy,
10:43but I can't blame him.
10:44I would do the same.
10:48I'm such a private person about my home
10:50and here I've just taken you through the entire house
10:53and really it's for a couple of reasons.
10:56I've never built anything all by myself before
10:58and I'm so proud of it.
11:00I'm filled with gratitude every time I walk into my house
11:03that I get to live here,
11:04that I'm so lucky to have my kids here.
11:07So it's unlike me and yet
11:10I'm so happy to have shared it with you.
11:26I loved hanging with you today.
11:27Bye, AD.
11:33Bye.