Like the Corner Bistro or Bleecker Street, Liv Tyler is synonymous with West Village living. A resident of one of Manhattan’s most charming neighborhoods for the past two decades, the actress has been photographed infinite times, with and without her children, on her local streets—walking her dog, pushing a stroller, or running in to her corner store to pick up a pantry staple. “I just love how I don’t even have to leave my block,” says Tyler. “Mary’s Fish Camp is my favorite restaurant. I grew up in Maine so I get all Maine food there. Lobster knuckles. And then going to my deli is my favorite thing. I literally go across the street and will talk to the guys there for, like, 45 minutes and get all my favorite treats.”
Although she recently purchased a townhouse in London (she is married to a Brit, sports agent Dave Gardner), she will always consider her lovingly restored, four-story townhouse on West 11th Street her home. “I come all the time for work,” says Tyler. “I've been here five times in the past few months. I just come and stay and plan little plans where I invite everyone that I love to come and be with me here. Everything I've ever owned is here. All my clothes, all my collections and all the little things.”
Tyler added pocket doors on either side of this central room in order to create two flanking rooms. “It’s been so many things over the years,” says Tyler. “At one time it was my office. Then it was [oldest son’s] Milo’s room. Then it became Sailor’s room. Now it’s Sailor and Lula’s room, and has been like this since I have had my [younger] children. This is where we play and read stories.” Many of the books are mine from when I was a kid,” says Tyler. “I always save everyone’s books.” Tyler worked with friend Vance Trimble, an interior designer and collector, to create all the curtains. “His brother is an ironmonger and made all the brass rods; they weigh a ton,” says Tyler. “The curtains are silk velvet because I wanted them to be really soft and cozy.” The two sheep on the fireplace mantle are from West Village children’s concept store Yoya. “I have them all over the house,” adds Tyler. The stacked reading cushions are by Coco-Mat.
It’s Tyler’s devotion to the little things, those most special character-defining details, that turned her property’s renovation into an absolute labor of love. Built in the late 1800s, the brownstone had already been through a handful of incarnations by the time Tyler purchased the building in 2001. “I had been told that three spinster sisters had lived there, which I loved,” says Tyler. “Then a politician owned it. Each floor was a two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment, and everything historic had been taken out of it. When I found it, it was really, really, really run down. You really needed to have a vision to see what it would be—and I could just see it.”
After meeting with a handful of architects, Tyler decided to work with Ben Petreath, who had been with Fairfax and Sammons at the time. “I picked them because they did hand drawings as opposed to all the computer-generated ones,” she recalls.
A pocket door with textured pink glass slides open to connect the closet with the master bathroom. “I spend a lot of time here,” says Tyler. “I always take big bubble baths. I read in the tub. Watch movies in the tub.” Framed photos include one of her grandmother, etiquette expert Dorothea Johnson, and one of her mother—model, musician, and author Bebe Buell. Others are stills from the film Stealing Beauty, which stars Tyler. “These are of me dressed as my character Lucy’s mother,” explains Tyler. “I have a blonde, short wig on, and I’m in a dress, smoking a long cigarette. A woman from another time.” Tyler and her architect Ben Pentreath found this vintage chandelier on one of their many visits to the famed Alfie’s Antique Market in London.
The two certainly had their work cut out for them. Says Tyler, “It was weird because even though I was so young, I really wanted to bring the house back to its original glory. I wanted to really honor the house and put back all the beautiful details. Literally, every window is new, every door is new. We gutted it down to the absolute brick. You would be in the basement looking up to the attic. The only thing that we kept was the stairs, all the beautiful carvings and the banisters, but each step, each tread and riser, had to be remade.”
Given the mandate, there was no room to cut corners. “We found these beautiful wood floors from a barn upstate, and got those in,” says Tyler. “And even things like the windows, I wanted them to look like the windows used to look, so we used Polish glass from this one factory where they would blow them into single panes. When you look up at them, the light just dances in them differently.”
Inside Liv Tyler's Dreamy West Village Townhouse
Wearing a Givenchy dress, actress Liv Tyler, a longtime muse of the fashion house, sits in the master bedroom, on a chaise longue that she designed and had made herself, tassels and all. “The coolest thing in the world, though” says Tyler is the Venetian-style mirror that hangs on the wall. You would never know it, but it opens to reveal the room’s flat-screen television. Tyler had been in the process of designing something similar based on inspiration images, where photographs of flowers would open as a cabinet, “but then we found this one online,” recalls Tyler. “I could not believe it!”
When Tyler first moved into her house she and her architect had hung an inexpensive pink Chinese paper lantern from the ceiling. Challenged by the room’s dimensions—Tyler needed something that could work in a really long, narrow room and that could be reflected in the mirror without being too much of a statement—she had a difficult time finding just the right chandelier. They ultimately landed on this piece, which is a collection of brass and pink strings and bulbs. “It just works,” says Tyler. “When you turn it on, it makes these insane geometric shapes on the ceiling. It’s so cool and manages to work within the very elaborate space.” An early work in resin by a friend, artist Dustin Yellin, sits in the center of the room’s fireplace mantel. “It’s one of the first things he made a long, long time ago,” says Tyler. “Like an experiment.”
The couch in the family’s parlor-floor library is a vintage Paul Evans piece from the late ’70s/early ’80s and has mirror panels on either end. Tyler had fallen in love with this Turkish woven striped rug from New York’s Double Knot carpet store so much that she decided to buy a bunch and stitch them together to create a single carpet that could work across the entire room. The brass and glass chandelier is an Angelo Lilli design, made by Arredoluce in Manza, Italy.
“I recently redid my bedroom, with the help of my friend Vicky Charles, who does a lot of the Soho House’s work. (The interior designer is also reported to have been hired by the Duchess of Sussex Meghan Markle to update her and Prince Harry’s Frogmore Cottage at Windsor Castle.) “We just had a whole lot of fabric and pieces, and put them together,” says Tyler, who paired her pillows and headboard with embroidered bedsheets from Schweitzer Linen. Bedside lamps are vintage holdovers from when Tyler was a teenager. “I have been looking forever for the lamps that I wanted,” says Tyler. Nothing can compete though with the room’s magical views. Fourth-floor corner windows look out to the top of a mature magnolia tree, which commands a private backyard garden completely obscured from neighbors. “It blossoms in my bedroom,” says Tyler. “It’s so incredible in the spring.”
The entire top floor serves as a master suite, which includes this light-filled and expansive walk-in closet. “It’s a his-and-hers closet, but I’ve taken over both of them,” says Tyler. Her husband, British sports agent Dave Gardner (and the father of Tyler’s youngest children, Sailor and Lula), keeps the majority of his things in their other home, a West London townhouse. Chicken-wire panels allow closet doors to remain transparent. “We were originally going to put fabric behind the chicken wire,” says Tyler. “Then we moved in and I really liked it open, so we never put the fabric in. The room has little secret drawers and lots of fun little details throughout.” The silver leaf wallpaper is vintage de Gournay. “On the lower portion [of the pattern] there are images of a Chinese countryside,” recalls Tyler. I cropped it just above so we could have only flowers.” The chandelier, one of a bunch of similar pieces Tyler has hanging throughout the home, is a vintage midcentury Italian design. The dress hanging at right is also vintage.
A pocket door with textured pink glass slides open to connect the closet with the master bathroom. “I spend a lot of time here,” says Tyler. “I always take big bubble baths. I read in the tub. Watch movies in the tub.” Framed photos include one of her grandmother, etiquette expert Dorothea Johnson, and one of her mother—model, musician, and author Bebe Buell. Others are stills from the film Stealing Beauty, which stars Tyler. “These are of me dressed as my character Lucy’s mother,” explains Tyler. “I have a blonde, short wig on, and I’m in a dress, smoking a long cigarette. A woman from another time.” Tyler and her architect Ben Pentreath found this vintage chandelier on one of their many visits to the famed Alfie’s Antique Market in London.
Tyler added pocket doors on either side of this central room in order to create two flanking rooms. “It’s been so many things over the years,” says Tyler. “At one time it was my office. Then it was [oldest son’s] Milo’s room. Then it became Sailor’s room. Now it’s Sailor and Lula’s room, and has been like this since I have had my [younger] children. This is where we play and read stories.” Many of the books are mine from when I was a kid,” says Tyler. “I always save everyone’s books.” Tyler worked with her friend Vance Trimble, an interior designer and collector, to create all of the curtains. “His brother is an ironmonger and made all the brass rods; they weigh a ton,” says Tyler. “The curtains are silk velvet because I wanted them to be really soft and cozy.” The two sheep on the fireplace mantel are from West Village children’s concept store Yoya. “I have them all over the house,” adds Tyler. The stacked reading cushions are by Coco-Mat.
This nursery was designed for her son Sailor, who is now four years old. “We moved [to London] when Lula was only six weeks, so she was still in her little bassinet,” says Tyler. “Now they both kind of use this room, depending on the trip, and who is traveling with me. Sometimes Sailor will still sleep in the crib, and sometimes [Lula] sleeps in the bed with me.” The whale of a wallpaper is the Melville pattern in black and white, from Cole & Son’s Whimsical collection.
“It’s my favorite room,” says Tyler of the kids’ bathroom. “The way the tree looks, through the window…it’s like this amazing bonsai or something, with branches going in strange directions. And the leaves are just beautiful.” Trimble worked with Tyler to get the bathroom just right, everything from the perfect slabs of statuary marble to the hand-carved shelves to the Jean Perzel sconce light fixtures. “I really wanted that kind of glamorous, Hollywood light by the mirror,” says Tyler, who had originally designed this bathroom for guests. “They give such beautiful light when you’re doing your makeup.” As for the shower curtain, the whale motif was coincidental: “That just happened that way. I had that before the wallpaper [in the nursery].”
Three-year-old daughter Lula calls this room her own. “I like to have little lights in the nook besides all my kids’ beds,” says Tyler of the brass sconce. “Having a reading light is so important.” Also essential are a fabric peacock from Yoya and a side-table stump from BDDW. “I have these all over my house,” says Tyler. The lilac chrysanthemum-print wallpaper is by Josef Frank for Svenskt Tenn. A single bright red runner travels the stairs and hallways, from the top to the ground floor. “Like a giant tongue,” says Tyler, whose father, Aerosmith legend Steve Tyler, happens to have one of the most photographed tongues in show business. Zoom in on the detail on the side of the staircase and you will see curlicue ornamentation. Tyler says that this was one of the few original details they were able to salvage from the house when her soup-to-nuts renovation project began. “We rebuilt the whole staircase around that,” says Tyler. We then continued that detail into some of the ironwork and other elements in the kitchen and around the house.”
The home’s kitchen look, feel, and layout was inspired by a photograph Tyler and Pentreath had come across of cabinet with very deep green—almost black—paint and white piping, next to a wooden table. “It was something I really loved,” says Tyler. “We designed the whole kitchen around that.” Tyler opted to keep the kitchen on the ground floor—as it would have been when the townhouse was built at the turn of the 19th century. “It’s so cozy down there, and you can go out into the garden to eat, as well.” While the working mom of three is not necessarily hosting dinner parties all the time, Tyler says, “We are cooking all the time. Everybody is always coming in—eating and snacking and squeezing around the table.” The light fixture above the table is a vintage 1940s lamp designed by Paavo Tynell of Finland.
Once a second-sink setup in the pantry area off the kitchen, this nook is now Tyler’s office. “I’m like a dinosaur,” says Tyler, of her vintage 1980s “hot lips” telephone. “I still have a landline. I’ll sit there and make calls and do emails and write, all that kind of stuff.” Stacks of her most favorite cookbooks share space with a vintage owl cookie jar and a gnome her son Milo made for his mom at a Color Me Mine pottery studio. The vintage chair is a design by Hans Wegner, made by Johannes Hansen of Copenhagen.
“It took me a long time to figure out what to put here,” says Tyler of this family hangout space, also off the kitchen. “We finally made this giant horseshoe couch to fit the whole shape of the room.” A portrait of a barefaced Tyler shot by makeup artist Francois Nars for his book Nars Persona and a Mick Rock photo of David Bowie share wall space with a large photo that was a gift to Tyler by a photographer she had met while on the set of The Lord of the Rings. “He was a massage therapist, and he worked with us to keep us healthy and strong because we were doing so much physical stuff,” says Tyler. The moonlighting photographer would later have an exhibit of his work. “He called me and said he had named this one ‘Liv’ and was sending it to me all the way from New Zealand, where he lives.” The antler sconce is by Ralph Pucci International.
“We researched the different cornices and moldings from the period in which the house had been built, ones in the Italianate style and then, picked ones we liked,” says Tyler of having to entirely re-create the home’s foyer, floor to ceiling. “That is how the staircase looked, though” she recalls. “And we kept that one piece of the banister, with the stripped down original wood, just like that. We hid a set of plans for the house in there!”
She and her team would spend hours at another West Village mainstay, the French eatery Tartine, poring over issues of World of Interiors, finding inspiration for each and every facet of the renovation. While the design had held her interest, Tyler was more than happy to join the crew and break a sweat as well. “There was scaffolding inside, all over the rooms, and I would get up and help them, they'd make these amazing carvings and you'd put the plaster up and slide it across to make the perfect shape,” says Tyler. “I love spending the afternoon with a plumber, an electrician, or a painter and learning about how things are done and what really stands the test of time. Because you can do a renovation that looks great, but if it’s crappy it just won’t last very long.”
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![Tyler added pocket doors on either side of this central room in order to create two flanking rooms. “It’s been so many things over the years,” says Tyler. “At one time it was my office. Then it was [oldest son’s] Milo’s room. Then it became Sailor’s room. Now it’s Sailor and Lula’s room, and has been like this since I have had my [younger] children. This is where we play and read stories.” Many of the books are mine from when I was a kid,” says Tyler. “I always save everyone’s books.” Tyler worked with friend Vance Trimble, an interior designer and collector, to create all the curtains. “His brother is an ironmonger and made all the brass rods; they weigh a ton,” says Tyler. “The curtains are silk velvet because I wanted them to be really soft and cozy.” The two sheep on the fireplace mantle are from West Village children’s concept store Yoya. “I have them all over the house,” adds Tyler. The stacked reading cushions are by Coco-Mat.](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/gBLo5n714V5s256NFgAjbQ--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MDtoPTY0MA--/https://media.zenfs.com/en/architectural_digest_422/e48ae8335597758495941e73793c850a)
![The entire top floor serves as a master suite, which includes this light-filled and expansive walk-in closet. “It’s a his-and-hers closet, but I’ve taken over both of them,” says Tyler. Her husband, British sports agent Dave Gardner (and the father of Tyler’s youngest children, Sailor and Lula), keeps the majority of his things in their other home, a West London townhouse. Chicken-wire panels allow closet doors to remain transparent. “We were originally going to put fabric behind the chicken wire,” says Tyler. “Then we moved in and I really liked it open, so we never put the fabric in. The room has little secret drawers and lots of fun little details throughout.” The silver leaf wallpaper is vintage de Gournay. “On the lower portion [of the pattern] there are images of a Chinese countryside,” recalls Tyler. I cropped it just above so we could have only flowers.” The chandelier, one of a bunch of similar pieces Tyler has hanging throughout the home, is a vintage midcentury Italian design. The dress hanging at right is also vintage.](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/Zo_8epMZULA1sO0TZWJzcQ--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MDtoPTY0MA--/https://media.zenfs.com/en/architectural_digest_422/e329a48649e6696d78337ec236cdd9c2)
![Tyler added pocket doors on either side of this central room in order to create two flanking rooms. “It’s been so many things over the years,” says Tyler. “At one time it was my office. Then it was [oldest son’s] Milo’s room. Then it became Sailor’s room. Now it’s Sailor and Lula’s room, and has been like this since I have had my [younger] children. This is where we play and read stories.” Many of the books are mine from when I was a kid,” says Tyler. “I always save everyone’s books.” Tyler worked with her friend Vance Trimble, an interior designer and collector, to create all of the curtains. “His brother is an ironmonger and made all the brass rods; they weigh a ton,” says Tyler. “The curtains are silk velvet because I wanted them to be really soft and cozy.” The two sheep on the fireplace mantel are from West Village children’s concept store Yoya. “I have them all over the house,” adds Tyler. The stacked reading cushions are by Coco-Mat.](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/7lbyNM8dG5uyIEShag.bLA--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MDtoPTY0MA--/https://media.zenfs.com/en/architectural_digest_422/03caccbc57a42a2bffca04d601fc3432)
![This nursery was designed for her son Sailor, who is now four years old. “We moved [to London] when Lula was only six weeks, so she was still in her little bassinet,” says Tyler. “Now they both kind of use this room, depending on the trip, and who is traveling with me. Sometimes Sailor will still sleep in the crib, and sometimes [Lula] sleeps in the bed with me.” The whale of a wallpaper is the Melville pattern in black and white, from Cole & Son’s Whimsical collection.](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/W0Oa8Dsonr3dOmiKcI.nrQ--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MDtoPTE0NDA-/https://media.zenfs.com/en/architectural_digest_422/08975b04f23c15b55b449f93f2755e68)
![“It’s my favorite room,” says Tyler of the kids’ bathroom. “The way the tree looks, through the window…it’s like this amazing bonsai or something, with branches going in strange directions. And the leaves are just beautiful.” Trimble worked with Tyler to get the bathroom just right, everything from the perfect slabs of statuary marble to the hand-carved shelves to the Jean Perzel sconce light fixtures. “I really wanted that kind of glamorous, Hollywood light by the mirror,” says Tyler, who had originally designed this bathroom for guests. “They give such beautiful light when you’re doing your makeup.” As for the shower curtain, the whale motif was coincidental: “That just happened that way. I had that before the wallpaper [in the nursery].”](https://s.yimg.com/ny/api/res/1.2/8I_pW0x1CRKtfszj3jCB1w--/YXBwaWQ9aGlnaGxhbmRlcjt3PTk2MDtoPTE0NDA-/https://media.zenfs.com/en/architectural_digest_422/6d8ce47d312ffc7809b223c6a72c8a5d)
