Text by Jorge Arango

Bill Willis, Tennessee-born antique dealer-cum-decorator who lived a fabulously louche life in Morocco, was known for a brand of pan-Arab exoticism he created for clients such as J. Paul and Talitha Getty, Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Bergé, Alain Delon and Marella Agnelli. It might seem a peculiar idea to tap Willis as muse for a Victorian home in Santa Cruz, California. But, in a sense, Willis—who nibbled hash cookies with William Burroughs and snorted cocaine with The Rolling Stones—has a certain spiritual bond to the bohemian, hippie-dippy aura of this town.

Nevertheless, when the owner of the home requested that her love of Moroccan and Moorish arts be expressed throughout the rooms, designer Alexandra Loew was initially skeptical. “I wasn’t sure one could surf between Victorian and Moroccan.” she says, “But I soon discovered that formally—amidst pointed arches, a shared penchant for filigree, and somber, often discordant, color combinations—the two styles were totally simpatico.”

So, she reached back to Bill Willis for inspiration.

But rather than going full-tilt outré as Willis might, Loew doled out the North African hypnotics in the measured, erudite manner that has become her signature. You can feel the learned discernment of her eye and the razor-sharp wit that drove this hybridized blend of 1960s Marrakesh meets 19th-century Victorian meets contemporary NoCal relaxed elegance.

As if the mandate wasn’t complex enough, there was another subtext at work as well. The sizable contemporary addition did not marry gracefully with the original architecture. So, she explains, "We vaulted ceilings, added exposed rafters, and shifted floorboard directions to make the spaces feel like porches that had been enclosed over time, or a warren of rooms that had slowly opened up over generations. The goal was to give the new addition the illusion of ad hoc charm — as if it had been shaped by time rather than a grand gesture."

• Jorge Arango