West World

On a Beverly Hills street with a star-studded past, Commune Design’s Steven Johanknecht imbues a 1920s Spanish Colonial Revival with Hollywood glamour and Wild West motifs.

As a cofounder of Commune Design, the Los Angeles firm known for its savvy mixing of vintage chic with high-end handicraft, Steven Johanknecht might be expected to know his Neutras from his Navajo rugs. But ask him about this renovation of a 1920s Spanish Colonial Revival house in Beverly Hills, and Johanknecht—a former store designer for Barneys New York and design director for Studio Sofield—starts enthusing about his latest obsession: Thomas C. Molesworth. “You’ve got to check him out,” he says. “He did all these interiors and furnishings in the cowboy style in the 1930s and ’40s. He designed lodges in Montana and Wyoming. His furniture was just incredible.” 

What pushed Johanknecht down the rabbit hole of classic Western design were his cowboy style–aficionado clients, a couple for whom he has designed several homes, most recently one near the ocean in the Pacific Palisades section of L.A. “I have always been enchanted by the West,” the wife says. “I buy cowboy art and plein air landscapes, old Western blankets, and furniture in that style. And my husband and I adore old Molesworth.”