Actress Jennifer Aniston collaborated with designer Stephen Shadley to transform the 1970s house by Harold W. Levitt into an inviting retreat

While renovating Jennifer Aniston’s house in Beverly Hills, designer Stephen Shadley extended the eaves, which were clad in cumaru, and put in travertine flooring. The umbrellas are from Janus et Cie.

“The making of the house was as significant to me as the living in it,” says Jennifer Aniston.

Aniston loved the tall entrance doors the moment she saw them. The Murano glass chandelier just inside is one of the first things she bought for the house. “Jen said things like ‘Zen’ and ‘Bali’ when we discussed the design—rather than doing a theme house, we got at the spirit of that,” says Shadley.

The living room is an intimate space that opens to views of the koi pond.

“The painting just spoke to her,” says Shadley of Robert Motherwell’s 1963 A Throw of Dice No. 17. In foreground, a Jacques Adnet ashtray for Hermès holds cigarette packs in Motherwell’s favorite blue.

The game room, with its bar and vintage pool table, is “a great hangout at parties,” says Shadley. “And there are lots of places to sit outside.”

A pizza oven and wine room are featured in the kitchen. A travertine bar separates it from the sitting area, where Aniston and her guests can relax or watch television.

“We made major changes in a very subtle way,” explains Shadley. “The house now has a more serene, monumental quality.” Aniston converted one of the his-and-her baths in the master suite into a spa bath with a soaking tub.

“I wanted to be able to curl up in it,” Jennifer Aniston says of the master bedroom. Shadley designed the platform bed, which has a motorized television lift topped with Rogers & Goffigon fabric. Of the shag rug, he says, “It’s wool and silk and very lush.”

“Jen was a very quick study,” notes Shadley. “Not everyone wants to be that involved in the design process. She loved the communal aspect of it and even did some very good drawings.”

Heated travertine floors warm the lanai, which can be enclosed with a bronze chain-mail curtain. The fabric on the love seat and chairs in foreground is from Holly Hunt, as are the pillow fabrics. Chella fabric covers the Shadley-designed chairs near the fireplace.