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A swimming pool wasn’t on professional skater Lizzie Armanto’s must-have list when she was scouring Zillow back in 2021. But that was before she came across a mid-century home in Los Angeles’s Highland Park neighborhood and learned that the backyard’s kidney-shaped fixture was designed by Blue Haven, a maker of iconically skateable pools. She willingly out-bid the 28 other offers on the property to make it hers. The pool itself was in poor condition, so there was no question it’d have to be reconstructed. After it had been drained and before a crew arrived, Armanto invited a few of her closest friends over to test it out. “It was such a surreal thing to have a session at my house,” she shares.
Technically, she can take her board inside, too. While working with her interior designer, Hannah Go of Studio Hanego, Armanto chose Richlite, the gold standard for skate ramp surfaces, as her flooring. To most people, the large-scale tiles might look like a version of laminate, so it’s just one of those IYKYK details. “When other skateboarders come over, they trip out when they see it,” Armanto says.
It was just one way the pair thought outside of the box during the design process. Throughout, Armanto often channeled her love of Finnish design great Alvar Aalto, whose Villa Mairea house has a similarly shaped free-form pool. The color blocked kitchen cabinets were largely inspired by Aalto’s Paimio Sanatorium in Finland, where hues were intentionally chosen to soothe tuberculosis patients. Last year, she even collaborated with Artek to create limited-edition stools featuring pieces from her old skate decks on the seat in the shape of iconic places to take a dip.
Go put a 2025 spin on things by making the kitchen’s dining nook super functional: the side bench features storage under the cushions (the perfect hiding place for an Instant Pot) and detaches so you can shift it to the other side of the table or out of the way completely. And while the cabinet fronts were all made by a local carpenter, the framing is IKEA. (Her floating bathroom vanity is also two combined IKEA vanity cabinets custom clad in white oak).
Sometimes in the mornings after friends have spent the night, Armanto will find someone sitting on the counter looking out onto the backyard through the pass-through window. (If you’re catching on, she doesn’t have many strict house rules). “When you’re a little kid, your parents tell you not to get on the counter. But once you’re an adult, you can really do whatever you want. It’s amazing,” she says with a laugh.
Hanging on the wall between the kitchen and living room is a quilted piece by artist Ben Venom that Armanto commissioned after her close friend and mentor Jeff Grosso passed away. The Mothra illustration is a nod to his Godzilla-inspired nickname. “When I started, there weren’t many women making a career of skateboarding,” says Armanto. “I’m really grateful he was there for me in a time when people like me didn’t have a voice in this industry.”
Other nods to friends can be found in the living room. A rice paper lamp shade by Jeff Cheung, the creator of Unity (a printing press and skateboard brand that supports queer people, trans people, and people of color) hangs over a Floyd swivel chair. Lance Mountain, a “legend in skateboarding and someone I’ve always looked up to,” says Armanto, made the miniature replica of a famous skate pool that’s encased in the coffee table.
Then of course, there’s the guest bathroom, which is one big ode to her real BFF, her dog Alma. The bubblegum pink and pistachio palette comes directly from her pup’s favorite caterpillar toy. “It just makes my home feel so much more cozy knowing that’s Alma’s bathroom,” says Armanto. “People get a kick out of it. She’s such a princess.” In an effort to maintain some of the home’s character, Go kept the pink sink and built-in cabinets and hunted down a tub and mosaic tile that look like they could be original to the house.
The designer specifically added built-ins to the entryway to hold her client’s massive sneaker collection. “This girl has shoes!” says the designer. But there’s still plenty of extra storage in the primary bedroom, where tall cabinets act as a divider. If Armanto’s bed frame on the other side of the wall looks familiar, that’s because it’s a riff on the cardboard beds she slept on while staying in the athlete’s village during the Tokyo Olympics. “I loved the ingenuity of it,” she says.
As renovations were taking place, Armanto hunkered down in similarly small quarters. The pool house-slash-office in the back served as her outpost for part of the year, though you’ll never hear her complain about being close to the garden. In addition to having design chops, she’s also got a green thumb, recalling the time she planted a sunflower seed in her parent’s backyard as a kid that grew two stories tall. Her L.A. yard, which came to life with the help of local landscape firm Dune Gardens, had to be hand-watered for the first two years. Now, it’s acclimated and thriving on its own. Armanto can relate.
“This house was a gift to myself. I’ve never lived in a place this nice,” she shares. “It’s really easy to deny yourself something you want just because it’s scary or unknown but at some point, you just have to go for it.”
