The three-year restoration of the “Semeria Castle” overlooking the Los Altos Golf & Country Club’s golf course was a labor of love for Maryam Eshghipour and Arya Behzad.
“I fell in love with the house from the very first moment I saw it,” Eshghipour said. “It feels like it has a soul because of its history.”
Interestingly, it took three years for Henry Semeria, a wholesale clothing dealer in San Francisco, to build the 10,000-square-foot house, which is reminiscent of a Norman chateau of late-medieval times. It has a steeply pitched tile roof broken in places by dormers, two circular towers with conical roofs and a rounded bay where the two wings of the house meet.
Semeria, who served in France during World War I, was inspired by a farmhouse he had seen in Normandy, sending a draftsman there to copy it. When the subsequent “castle” was completed in 1928, his wife Rose and their daughter and son-in-law Mignon and Morgan Fottrell and grandson Morgan Jr. moved in.
Semeria continued to live and work in San Francisco and by 1932 had remarried. The Fottrells and Rose lived there until 1941.
Eshghipour and Behzad are the fifth owners. They relocated here from the San Diego area at the behest of relatives and business associates; however, they are no strangers to the Bay Area having both graduated from UC Berkeley. He is an electrical engineer at Apple Inc. and worked for Broadcom Corp. for 16 years, and she is a civil engineer.
Escrow on the house closed on New Year’s Eve 2011. It was the only house they considered in the area after comparing it with three other properties. This is remarkable considering that they looked at 150 houses in San Diego before buying there.
“I have an appreciation for artists and craftsmen,” Eshghipour said. “I feel like they’ve left something of themselves in the house. I feel very connected to it.”
Major renovations
On her first visit, she introduced herself to the owner, Joyce Anderson, who had raised six children there with husband Wayne, a Los Altos chiropractor for 40 years.
“Mrs. Anderson told me that I had the same look in my eyes as when she had seen the house for the first time,” Eshghipour said.
Eshghipour managed all facets of the restoration and property development, which entailed securing 26 permits.
“The house was empty and unlivable,” she said. “We rewired the house and installed new plumbing, heating and air conditioning.”
The couple added fire sprinklers, a central alarm system and Cat6 wiring throughout the house, as well as state-of-the-art home automation, whole-house audio and video, and security and surveillance systems.
Outside, the couple added a tennis court, landscaped the grounds, updated the swimming pool (it now has a waterfall, diving board and infinity edge) and rebuilt the guest house (former servants’ quarters) and attached garage, which had been destroyed in a 2012 fire.
“The landscaping and hardscape took more than a year and cost almost as much as fixing the house,” Eshghipour said.
The house itself glows and exudes warmth. It’s homey despite its size – four bedrooms, five-and-a-half baths, reception hall and numerous formal and informal rooms.
Eshghipour preserved the decorative architectural elements and brought the Venetian plaster back to life. All of the staircases, doors, closets, grating, hardware, pulls and wood floors (with the exception of the family room) are original to the house, as are nearly all of the sconces, chandeliers and tile floors.
The original variegated, partially blackened red bricks that decorate the outdoor terrace, stairs and walkways were cleaned and regrouted – a laborious process that took months.
Lion motif
The main entrance to the house is a narrow, gabled pavilion with a Romanesque arch decorated with lion heads on the column capitals – a motif Eshghipour has repeated in the outdoor decor. The stone fountain in the new auto court features four lion heads, the swimming pool has a pair of lion-head fountains and the steps leading to the terrace are guarded by a pair of lions.
An arched Philippine mahogany double door with medieval-style hammered bronze hardware sits at the entryway, whose Venetian plaster walls were restored to their original condition by master plasterer Kelly Peterson of Layers of Color in Sacramento. She also turned wood windowsills in the entryway into “stone” and refurbished a bedroom fireplace, noteworthy for its distinctive Madonna and child relief.
Keith Studer from Southern Cal Painting did all the interior and exterior painting, staining and faux finishing, including transforming white cast-resin outdoor sculptures into colorful works of art. He traveled from his San Diego home multiple times, spending one to two months each time working on the house.
Eshghipour worked with general contractor Alan Hills of Hills Construction Inc. in San Jose on all facets of bringing the house into the 21st century. Perhaps the most significant change was transforming the service wing of the house – pantry, kitchen, laundry room, two maids’ bedrooms and bath – into a modern, rustic-style kitchen and family room. A butler’s call box, a remnant of early days, is displayed above a doorway.
A glass-enclosed sun porch (formerly used for storage) off the living room has become a bar and sitting room affording views of the golf course. A triptych of female golfers from a bygone era, purchased by Eshghipour at an antiques shop, adds just the right touch. The pub-style bar with its stained-glass ceiling and motifs was one of her online purchases. Hills modified it to fit the space, added a refrigerator and copper sink and it was good to go.
Eshghipour haunts consignment stores, antiques shop and online sites to find just the right items for the house. For example, the table and chairs in the mahogany-paneled study date back to 1928 – the year the house was completed.
And now that the restoration is a fait accompli, she and her husband hosted a celebration last month, inviting the contractors and their crews, neighbors, family and friends. The setting was the gazebolike carport – which boasts speakers, lights and a floor with a permanent stenciled design that doubles as a dance floor – and an outdoor kitchen installed beneath a centuries-old pine tree.
“We wanted to say thank you and have everyone enjoy the end result,” Eshghipour said. m
