HILUXURY – Hawaii Luxury Magazine

Self-expression in the many dwellings of a man

FOR MANY GUYS

The ultimate mode of self-expression is creating a room filled with their many obsessions, experience markers and favorite toys. Here’s a look at several “man’s rooms,” dedicated to all things awesome.

STAR WARS THEATER

With full-sized, talking R2D2 and C3PO mannequins and all the lights and sounds of the Star Wars ship, this home theater offers a different kind of “man’s room.” According to Jeff Morrison of Long & Associates, this Hawaii Loa Ridge room was built for an avid Star Wars fan, who “wanted somewhere he could escape to and watch movies.” Fiber-optic lightboxes in the “windows” create the illusion of looking into space, and the electronic sliding door features a hand-motion sensor switch to open it. The room is acoustically isolated from the rest of the house for optimum sound to take place in the theater.

ENGLISH PUB

This man’s room was once a dusty, unused pool house, but has been transformed into a slice of Merrie Olde England. Thanks to the vision and passion of its owner, Laurence Martin, an antiques dealer and prominent Kiwanian in El Segundo, Calif., reclaimed wood and repurposed furniture from his shop comprises an English pub in honor of his hometown football (soccer) team, The Bournemouth Cherries.

A signature feature of this man’s room is the handcrafted stained glass window which reads “Bottled Beer,” made by an English glazier in El Segundo. The ceiling is painted to resemble blue sky and clouds.

GARAGE REFUGE

No other place in the house belongs to a guy like the garage.

In the top photo, windsurfer Robby Naish stores surfboards, a hearse (which he says transports his surfboards well) and more in his Maui garage.

Darrold Efflandt of El Segundo, Calif., took a lowly two-car garage and turned it into a cool gathering place. Originally created as a refuge for himself and his aging father, the spot is now nicknamed the “Alley Bar,” with everything from a shuffleboard, Pachinko, pinball and a roulette wheel, to the obligatory stuffed deer head and big screen TV.

MAN’S STUDY

The “soul” of Ricardo Pomar’s North Shore home lies in his sleek, yet eclectic, study. The room contains dozens of books on a diverse array of subjects – surfing tomes by Greg Noll and Ricky Grigg, Let’s Fix this Broken Democracy by Krist Novoselic, The Odyssey by Homer, among others – and is outfitted with the quintessential leather couch.

Pomar says his girlfriend, Diana Novoselic, fixed up the room as a surprise while he was away in Indonesia, and she created a perfect living space where comfort and meaningful items reside. Personal photos and a 1975 Lightning Bolt surfboard shaped by Tom Parrish tell of Pomar’s amazing life experiences.

“She put all the things that I love in one room,” he says.