it that much more joyful.” His desk sits under the single window. “My laptop is the one concession to the modern age,” Platt says. Next to it is a functioning rotary phone; he uses a fountain pen. Not every home library is anachronistic. San Francisco-based firm Feldman Architecture and interior designer Raili Clasen recently brought a library/work loft to a Pebble Beach home as part of a renovation meant to brighten shared spaces. The open concept overlooks the main living space—not necessarily a place for rereading Shakespeare’s entire collection. Even in the era of e-readers, home libraries remain popular, and design elements can make them usable and inviting—not just museums of books that collect dust. Also in Pebble Beach, Michael Kean, a Sherlock Holmes expert and retired publishing executive, has designed a functional library to house his collection of roughly 6,500 Holmes-related books. (His and his wife Connie’s other books are shelved elsewhere in the house.) They had lived here for about 18 years before they embarked on renovations to the kitchen and bathrooms— and Kean’s dream library. He’d been envisioning wood he saw at a cocktail lounge in an older Seattle hotel, which a cabinet maker with Pacific Grove-based Travaille Brothers helped him replicate with black oak wood and a bright stain. Step one of the project was discovering that the 8-foot drop ceilings could come out, giving the library the opportunity to go as high as the 18-foot roofline, and room for built-in shelves on every wall, with the uppermost parts of the collection accessible from a ladder. A bay window added natural light over Kean’s desk, where he spends several hours a day working on Sherlockian scholarship as the recent president of the Baker Street Irregulars. “I use the library the way someone might when the only computers that existed were mainframes,” Kean says. “I don’t read books online. I am more comfortable holding a book.” And the space that holds his books is likewise comfortable and inviting. NIC COURY Michael Kean accommodates his collection of 6,500 Sherlock Holmes-related volumes on tall shelves accessible from a ladder. 34 THE BEST OF MONTEREY BAY ® HAVEN 2026-2027 Where Style & Inclusivity create unforgettable experiences Where Style & Inclusivity create unforgettable experiences (831) 717-8692 581 Pine Ave, Pacific Grove, CA, 93950 thecharlespacificgrove.com (707) 727-7979 1556 Polk St Napa, CA 94559 thecharlesnapavalley.com Charles_1-2h_Haven2025_DG.indd 1 7/22/25 4:57 PM Untitled-37 1 6/12/26 12:06 PM
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