With references to her career-defining roles and smatterings of family heirlooms, the personal touches throughout Dunst’s 1930s ranch house make it more than just a beautiful space.
A Frits Henningsen wingback chair (which she calls her “‘Spider-Man’ purchase”) and an Elizabeth Peyton portrait of Marie Antoinette hearken back to career-defining roles, Dunst said in an interview for the November issue of Architectural Digest. Meanwhile, her grandfather’s antique shipmodels and a piece of scrap wood painted by Dunst’s 3-year-old son, Ennis, add immediate warmth to the San Fernando Valley property.
“Our home is the gathering spot where everyone comes to eat, drink, swim, make music,” Dunst told the magazine. “The bar is always in full swing. We want people to have a good time, so as much as we value pretty, nothing is too precious.”
The design process was equally personal. Dunst’s interior designer is Jane Hallworth, an old friend who she sought help from when furnishing her first LA home 20 years ago. Some pieces from that initial project – including a Baguès ship-form crystal chandelier – traveled with Dunst to her current residence, which she shares with her fiancé, actor Jesse Plemons, and their two young sons.
Their home is filled with dichotomies – feminine and masculine, glamorous and rustic – and Plemons’ Texas roots (or “cowboy aesthetic,” as Hallworth calls it) shine through with antique Majolica tiles lining the kitchen backsplash and a boot spur-esque living room chandelier.
To fit all these seemingly disparate elements into the same home, Hallworth said they had to “shake it all up into just the perfect cocktail.”
That mixture achieves peak coziness in the toy-filled nursery. It’s rustic and whimsical, plucked straight from a children’s storybook. The woodsy furniture and sage velvet window coverings blend with the foliage outside the window, creating a kind of treehouse effect.
Sage makes a reappearance on the main bathroom walls, where it intersects with wood detailing. Adding a touch of vintage, the door is a reclaimed piece from Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’ New York City apartment. But the room’s real showpiece is a deep, 19th-century copper tub.
Regardless of the variety in references and styles, the common denominator throughout Dunst’s home is “anything that sparks an emotional connection,” she said.
“She gets inspired by beautiful things. She can see the poetry in them,” Hallworth told Architectural Digest. “For her, it’s not about style or pedigree per se, but that sweet, lovely call of home.”
