ABOUT

The Blanco Bungalow

It all started as a blog. Documenting the design and restoration of our first home, a 1920’s, 1200-square-foot Spanish Bungalow, in Long Beach, California. However, after ripping off my first tile, I knew this was going to be much more.

We moved to Long Beach in October 2018 from Venice Beach, CA. After giving birth to my son, Coyote in 2017, we both decided it was time to purchase our first home. My dream was always a little Spanish Bungalow loaded with charm and history. We looked and looked for months in Los Angeles, but couldn’t afford anything. Not wanting to leave LA, but both still needing to be in close proximity for work, we started expanding our search and found an adorable little up-and-coming neighborhood called Wrigley in Long Beach that we could afford. I found a listing that didn’t look too promising (our realtor seemed shocked when I said I wanted to look at it), but I saw the red tile Spanish roof and arches, and I knew we had to take a look. There was purple carpet, brown walls, no sunlight, and it needed some serious love, but we saw her good bones and all the potential. We restored her project by project, taking us exactly four years. We’ve learned everything as we went (mostly from youtube videos:), and some projects don’t go quite as planned, but I loved every minute of it.

In January 2022, we went on a surf trip to Portugal, and after that trip, decided we to sell our beloved blanco bungalow. We planned on keeping our first house forever and never selling. However, after the pandemic, we decided it was time to shake things up and try something new. in december 2022, we sold our home in california, and moved to portugal. After a year of searching for our dream home, we finally found it, and in january 2024, we signed the deed.

I hope you’ll continue to follow along with us.

♥

With Gratitude,

Laura, Strader & Coyote

The Blanco Bungalow