Barefoot, in shorts and a tropical-themed short-sleeved shirt, Will Burroughs walks through the narrow backyard of his Venice home and passes a football to his 7-year-old son Jack.
It’s a playful moment that instantly sparks the curiosity of the family’s Australian cattle dog, Banjo, who comes running from the first floor of the newly added accessory dwelling unit, or ADU, at the rear of the property.
Even though it’s a small gesture, it encapsulates what Burroughs and his wife, Frith Dabkowski, hoped for when they added the ADU to their backyard.
With their home in the background, Frith Dabkowski and husband Will Burroughs are joined by their son Jack and dog Banjo on a single ribbon of wood that runs the entire length of the garage.
“They’re fun,” architect Aejie Rhyu said of the creative couple as she walked by the undulating two-story ADU she helped them realize.
Rhyu’s assessment helps to explain the joy that permeates the family compound, from the pink Los Angeles Toile wallpaper in the bedroom (humorously adorned with illustrations of L.A.’s beloved mountain lion P-22, the La Brea Tar Pits and Grauman’s Chinese Theatre) to the tricked-out garage on the first floor, which includes overhead bike storage, an espresso maker, a mini-fridge and a large flat screen TV that allows Sydney-born Burroughs to watch Formula 1 car races and cricket games at 4 a.m. when his family is asleep.
The one-bedroom unit features a full kitchen, custom millwork, colorful bathroom tile and a waterfall island that dips to create a dining room table.
Like so many ADUs in Los Angeles, the couple’s addition was driven by a need for more space to accommodate work and family life. At a time when California ADU laws continue to evolve to encourage more housing, the couple saw it as an opportunity to demolish their garage and build a new multipurpose flexible space that includes an office, garage and housing for family members from Australia who stay for weeks at a time.
To help them create an ADU that was fun and ambitious, Burroughs reached out to his childhood friend, Australian architect James Garvan, whom he has known since kindergarten.
A view of the ADU, including its rooftop terrace, from the street …
… and from the backyard.
Garvan said that when he first received a call from Burroughs about designing an ADU, he was impressed by the American concept of adding a second home on the same property as a larger one. “It’s an elegant way to activate parts of the city that are otherwise unused,” he said.
The couple collaborated with Garvan on the design plans, but because he was in Australia, they subsequently engaged local architect Rhyu to deliver the project. Despite his location on the other side of the world, Garvan worked with the team during FaceTime and Zoom meetings.
The ground floor of the ADU serves as a garage, office and media room for the family.
Burroughs installed a subwoofer speaker beneath the sofa to give the garage the feel of a movie theater during family movie nights. “Jack went flying off the couch when we watched “Top Gun,” he said, laughing.
“We wanted to contribute to the street and not just to the backyard,” Garvan said of a neighborhood tour he took on FaceTime with Burroughs. “It was crucial that the ADU referenced the neighborhood. That’s why we have the lovely tapered geometry and white fence paneling as cladding — it continues the fence and ties the house to the neighborhood.”
The couple, 41-year-old marketing executives who met while working at an advertising agency in San Francisco, may have wanted a showstopper. But they also wanted to respect their neighborhood, where small bungalows coexist alongside enormous, newly built homes in a Brutalist style.
Dramatic shutters that can be opened and closed give the ADU the feel of a music box.
“We were adamant about not having a monolithic structure,” Burroughs said, emphasizing the neighborhood’s diverse architectural styles where noted Los Angeles architects such as Frank Gehry, Ray Kappe and Barbara Bestor have all practiced their craft.
Dabkowski, who was born in England and moved to Dallas when she was 11, shared a similar perspective in not wanting the ADU to stand out too much. “I grew up in the suburbs where homes were built in a development and all looked the same,” she said. “I love the array of different houses in Venice, but it is jarring when people build something out of scale with the neighborhood.”
Situated on a corner lot, the two-story ADU appears simple and square from the street and curvaceous and soft from the backyard. While the traditional 1949 bungalow out front is one level, the ADU out back is tall but doesn’t overwhelm the atmosphere of the street.
Working with Plot Design LA, the family were able to preserve a segment of the backyard, which gives the dog and kids room to run around. “There’s a nice thoroughfare,” Burroughs said. “Kids ran around and threw water balloons at Jack’s 7th birthday party.”
Jack Burroughs, 7, plays with blocks as the family dog Banjo runs into the ADU.
Once inside the compound, the ADU, which cost approximately $450,000 after several increases due to the custom millwork and spiral staircase, is not what you would expect. And that’s precisely the point.
“We told James from the beginning that the ADU is separate from the house and is supposed to be different,” Burroughs said.
Pink Los Angeles Toile wallpaper from Flavor Paper adds a touch of whimsy in the bedroom of the ADU.
Clad in stained cedar siding with shutters that open and close like a music box, the ADU is composed of a 460-square-foot garage on the ground floor and a 560-square-foot one-bedroom unit one flight up. A custom steel spiral staircase connects the two floors on the outside of the building, as it would have eaten up too much space if placed inside. Above it all is a rooftop terrace with views of Santa Monica, the Marina and Penmar Park, with Burroughs affectionately comparing it to “being up in the trees.”
Inside, the open-plan kitchen, living room and dining area are flooded with natural light from two large circular skylights. A waterfall island, equipped with storage on either side, dips to form a dining room table. Floor-to-ceiling custom cabinets in the kitchen continue into the living room, where they create a media center. Adjacent to a queen-sized Murphy bed, there’s a stackable washer and dryer, as well as a linen closet. Cork tile flooring adds warmth and serves as an acoustic buffer to help separate the unit from the office space below.
Architect Aejie Rhyu of ARA-la Studio in Los Angeles collaborated with Australian architect James Garvan on the project, which took more than a year to complete.
Working with interior designer Danielle Lanee, Dabkowksi added colorful accents to the living spaces to make the interiors “warm, inviting and fresh.”
“They wanted the ADU to be a fun experience for their guests,” noted Rhyu. “There’s an outdoor shower. Colorful lighting. It’s quite different from the main house, but it works because it’s situated on a corner lot. When you are in the backyard, you note that, but from the street, it almost feels like its own separate structure.”
Will Burroughs and his future architect James Garvan prepare to rollerblade in Sydney, Australia.
(Courtesy of James Garvan)
At one point, Burroughs worried they were having too much fun with the colorful interiors, which include pink and red clé tile in the bathroom, pale green custom cabinets in the kitchen and pink Flavor Paper wallpaper in the bedroom. “I was worried it would feel like you were living in a Mondrian painting,” he said.
Now that it’s complete, however, Burroughs is thrilled with the way it turned out. “Frith added a lot of whimsy to the ADU,” he said. “I love that it feels homey and functional, and I love the balance with the architecture. Once you walk inside, you don’t feel like you’ve sacrificed form or function.”
In Sydney, where he grew up, Burroughs said architecture is often designed in harmony with the landscape. Here, his childhood friend was assigned the same task. “I was impressed that James was able to take a rectangular block … and make it sit beautifully with the trees and fence line,” he said. “And Aejie took drawings from afar, accomplishing them by walking around with a camera and reviewing drone footage. Aejie was able to take his high-order thing and make it work.”
Looking ahead, the couple envisions the unit could work as a rental, but for now, it has been booked by family and friends, including those who were displaced by the Pacific Palisades fires in January. The couple have hosted Burroughs’ parents for six weeks at a time, and friends with three kids — who shared the Murphy bed — stayed for 10 days.
In the living area of the ADU, custom millwork includes a Murphy bed, floor-to-ceiling storage, a linen closet and a stackable washer and dryer.
“It’s nice to have enough space where family can come and stay comfortably for a decent amount of time,” Dabkowski said. “Staying in an Airbnb is expensive.”
The ADU impressed Burroughs’ parents so much that they hired Gavan to design a home for them in Sydney now that they are downsizing.
“They were so impressed with the skylights, the airflow of the unit, which improves our quality of life tremendously,” Burroughs said. “Our mothers are best friends. He’s [Gavan] going to be a part of the family even more now.”
“I am happy that my friends like their home, but I hope the community likes it too,” Gavan added. “I hope it contributes positively to the streetscape.”
The ADU is designed to engage with the landscape and nestle into the garden, says architect James Garvan.
The couple treasure the personality and history of their 1949 bungalow. “We just love it so much and don’t feel like we need to match the ADU,” Dabkowski said. “The old and the new can live in harmony together.”
The latest episode of Love Island sent shockwaves through the villa as the dramatic ‘Sleepover’ twist led to four islanders being brutally dumped in a massive twist
Be glad you’re not Jeff Bezos or Lauren Sánchez. Sure, being that rich would be awesome, but being rich comes with rich-people problems. With their Italian wedding imminent, they have a host of things to worry about that would never cross the imaginations of other, more average couples who don’t have 12 digits representing their net worth.
Most details of the Venice fête are being kept close to the vest. A couple of local companies have confirmed they are contributing handcrafted glassware and local pastries to the wedding-favor goodie bags. Some guests’ names leaked when the invites went out in March (we name-drop below, never fear).
But a few details that might be quite vexing to the bride and groom are playing out in public. Let’s take a look.
Your destination wedding’s destination might hate you
All of Venice may not truly be ticked off, but photos, activists and media coverage make it seem that way.
Venice teacher and activist Marta Sottoriva called the wedding “the symbol of all that is wrong with Venice.”
“There’s a lot of anger in the air because once again the council has enslaved itself to the logic of profit — our city has been sold to the highest bidder,” she told the Guardian. “Every time an event of this kind happens, the city comes to a standstill, certain areas become inaccessible and even more tourists arrive.” (Venice has been really annoyed lately by its number of tourists, kind of like the Louvre is really annoyed.)
“No Space for Bezos” activists speak at a public meeting of residents on June 13 in Venice, Italy.
(Andrea Merola / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
But tourism councilor Simone Venturini was shocked that anyone might be upset that such a high-profile event was happening in the city.
“We should all be proud that the Bezos wedding, an event of international importance, is being held in the waters of our lagoon,” he told the Guardian. “Instead, the usual protest professionals have wasted no time. We want to reiterate that Venice is open to everyone.”
Venturini was more colorful in speaking to the Wall Street Journal, saying, “If Bezos’ wedding goes ahead as planned, without these pain-in-the-ass protests, Venetian citizens won’t even notice.”
The couple’s London-based wedding planners, Lanza & Baucina, told CNN in a statement, “Rumors of ‘taking over’ the city are entirely false and diametrically opposed to our goals and to reality.” They and the client, the planners said, wanted to minimize any disruption to the city.
That said, it’s impossible to get a reservation this week at the Aman Venice, the nearly 500-year-old hotel on the Grand Canal where the happy couple are rumored to be staying, at least for part of their wedding week, along with a host of wedding guests. The place is fully booked through Sunday, per TMZ, at a reported $2,000 to $10,000 a night per room.
Protests could really screw things up
Forget throwing soup on the “Mona Lisa” — the Bezos wedding protesters might do something truly offensive: They are threatening to screw up traffic on the big day.
“Bezos will never get to the Misericordia [event space],” activist Federica Toninello told an appreciative crowd last week, according to CNN. “We will block the canals, line the streets with our bodies, block the canals with inflatables, dinghies, boats.”
Having just learned what the Misericordia is, we have no idea what role the location might play in the nuptials, but it looks like a nice enough spot for a reception. Fondazione Giorgio Cini, a cultural center built in 1951, has also been floated as a wedding venue. But let’s get back to the blockades and such.
Another speaker at that same rally said she didn’t want Venice remembered as a beautiful wedding venue but “as the city that did not bend to oligarchs.”
“We can’t miss a chance to disrupt a $10-million wedding,” Na Haby Stella Faye said — because, really, how often does that chance come around? Although her goal stated at the rally was “to stop this wedding,” in her Instagram stories Monday, she was promoting a planned Saturday protest of Bezos, President Trump and, well, war.
A massive banner targeting Jeff Bezos, the world’s second-richest man, is laid out in the Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy, ahead of his wedding to Lauren Sánchez.
(Greenpeace / Associated Press)
Less aggressive protests include a host of banners and “No Space for Bezos” posters that have been hung around the city. A colossal message from Greenpeace to Bezos was laid out Monday in the Piazza San Marco. The square banner, which read “IF YOU CAN RENT VENICE FOR YOUR WEDDING YOU CAN PAY MORE TAX,” was quickly folded up and carried away by local cops, the Associated Press reported.
“It’s absurd to treat this city like it’s Disneyland,” said Grazia Satta, a retired teacher and social worker, per the Wall Street Journal. “The message this wedding sends is that rich people can do whatever they want. We shouldn’t kneel before wealth like this.”
By Monday, Bezos’ security team was making last-minute changes to try to outsmart the activists, according to TMZ. Even the water-taxi companies are being “kept in the dark,” the site said, and if the water taxis don’t know what’s going on, who really does?
Perhaps Bezos could tap that $212-billion bank account and enlist a Prime Delivery person to drop off himself and his bride discreetly at their reception? Though the human-size Amazon box could be a dead giveaway.
Whose yacht is biggest — and where will they park?
Yes, we know yachts don’t “park,” they drop anchor. But no matter what you call it, the biggest yachts can’t drop anchor in all parts of Venice.
One wedding theory has held that Bezos and Sánchez will exchange their vows on his 417-foot yacht, the Koru, where he proposed to her two years ago after five years of dating. But reported plans to dock the yacht in a lagoon might have changed. Apparently the close-to-shore concept is starting to look like a safety hazard due to those threatened protests of the second-richest man in the world.
The Koru is far from the only big boat floating around town, mind you. Venice has nine “yacht ports,” all of which have been booked for the wedding week. Apparently, TMZ reported, noncelebrity billionaire yacht owners are altering their Venice vacation plans to avoid the crush. That has to sting.
Fortunately, although the yacht situation is fluid and the airspace over Venice is closed, CNN reported that private helicopters are being given a pass, in case a head of state decides to chopper in. As one does.
One type of watercraft not involved in the festivities? Gondolas, or at least those piloted by people the WSJ talked to. “We are too slow,” one gondolier lamented.
International events might affect the guest list
President Trump reportedly scored an invitation to the wedding. Unclear if a plus-one for Melania was included. However, the commander in chief is a wee bit busy handling world events these days — hard to tell if he will be able to get away, even for a gala event like this one. Aren’t destination weddings the worst? So inconvenient.
That said, Ivanka Trump and hubby Jared Kushner reportedly got invited too, along with Jared’s brother Joshua Kushner and model wife Karlie Kloss. So the first family might be represented after all. And who knows, POTUS could swing by. Does Marine One count as a “private” helicopter?
Others on the guest list, per TMZ, include Leonardo DiCaprio, Oprah Winfrey, Gayle King, Bill Gates, singer Jewel, Kim Kardashian, Kris Jenner, Corey Gamble, Barbra Streisand, Eva Longoria, Katy Perry, Orlando Bloom, Brian Grazer, Barry Diller, Diane von Furstenberg, models Brooks Nader and Camila Morrone, and Queen Rania of Jordan. Perry won’t attend, though, because she’s on tour.
The couple was horrified to stumble upon a mammoth rat had broken into their room in the dead of night with the man thinking his girlfriend was ‘just imagining things’
Kiran Morjaria appeared on BBC This Morning earlier this year(Image: BBC)
A British doctor on holiday in Sri Lanka was “horrified” when his girlfriend woke him in the middle of the night convinced something was inside their room.
When he turned on the lights to reality was disgusting – a rat the size of a small cat was in their luxury hotel room.
Kiran Morjaria, a doctor and Youtuber, shared a truly horrifying story with his 32,000 TikTok followers that will leave anyone wanting to sleep with the lights on during your next getaway.
He said: “When I was in Sri Lanka last year my girlfriend is terrified of insects and that sort of thing. She got me up and said ‘I can hear something’ in the middle of the night. I said ‘You are just imagining it – there is nothing here.’”
However, 10 minutes later his girlfriend woke him up again – certain there was something in the suite with them. Kiran continued: “About ten minutes later she gets me up again and says ‘I can definitely hear something in the room so I get up and turn the light on.’”
It is at this point Kiran saw the enormous rat that has been with them all along. He said: “And there I see the biggest rat I have ever seen in my life. I’m talking literally the size of a small cat.”
What the mammoth rat was doing was even more “horrendous”. Kiran said the rodent was “nibbling on our clothes inside the room.”
Kiran asked his followers to share their own horror stories in the comments – and some of them were gruesome.
Kiran shared his holiday horror story (Image: TikTok/ kiran.morjaria)
One described the severe embarrassment she experienced at the hands of her kids’ nappy mishap. She said: “We had the entire swimming pool closed off as our new-born baby pooped in his swim nappy and its was explosive upset tummy we was very embarrassed.”
Euan’s story was explosive in a different way. He shared: “At Nantes airport my T-shirt got swabbed for explosives multiple times and came back and cause I was playing with cap guns the day before.”
Meanwhile Katy barely made it out of the airport before her holiday was turned upside down – narrowly escaping death. She said: “Leaving JFK airport for Manhattan, Taxi speeding, 60mph head on collision, Police said we’re lucky not going home in a body bag, taken to Queens Hosp!”
The giant rat had the couple shocked (Image: AFP/Getty Images)
One commenter chimed in regarding Kiran’s tale saying they would have struggled to get back to sleep. They said: “Arrrrrhhh (not even scared of rats normally but I’d have screamed and not slept.”
Scott McCormick and his girlfriend Helena Boshwick were due to fly from Birmingham Airport on May 1 to Palma de Mallorca, Spain when they claimed they were bumped from the Ryanair flight
Demi Koutouzi and Milo Boyd Digital Travel Reporter
10:28, 18 Jun 2025Updated 10:45, 18 Jun 2025
Scott McCormick and Helena Boshwick said they were bumped from the plane(Image: Kennedy News/@scott.morelifecoaching)
A holidaymaker discovered that a common method to save money on Ryanair flights backfired – when he was booted off without a refund as he ‘hadn’t reserved a seat’.
Scott McCormick and his girlfriend Helena Boshwick, both 33, were due to fly from Birmingham Airport on May 1 to Palma de Mallorca, Spain, for a week-long holiday and gym-mentorship event. Scott said they had not paid to reserve seats – which typically costs between £4.50 and £33 per seat – because it was a short two-hour flight and they didn’t mind if they didn’t sit together.
Everything went as normal, with the couple the first in the boarding queue. Then a Ryanair staff member approached them and asked if they would step aside while the rest of the passengers boarded. The staff member reportedly told the couple the flight was full and that there was only one available seat left.
Have you been on a flight that’s gone wrong? Email [email protected]
The couple said they were bumped from the Ryanair flight(Image: NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Scott said the two had a ‘meltdown’ as they had wanted to travel together, but said a staff member claimed it was because they ‘hadn’t reserved a seat’. The gym-owner claims they protested and were finally told that they could both get on the next flight and receive a refund for both tickets.
When the couple went to the check-in desk again, they were reportedly told they still had to pay for one of the tickets, while Scott claims he never received a refund. After sharing his ordeal on social media, many suggested Scott and Helena were singled out because they had not reserved seats – suggesting a technique many use to keep fares low could end up costing people more.
Scott, from Birmingham, West Midlands, said: “We checked in the night before and we didn’t reserve a seat but you normally just get a random one. Me and my partner thought it’s not that much of a problem if we’re not sitting together for a two-hour flight, we’re adults here.
“We turned up, everything went as normal, went through security as normal, went to the gate after waiting a couple of hours and we were the first ones at the gate ready for boarding. The lady scanned our boarding passes and told us to step to the side for a second. That moment was a red flag, I thought, ‘there’s something happening here’.
“We stepped to the side and watched all the people board the flight. I asked her to tell us what is going to happen and she said ‘no’. When everyone boarded, she said, ‘the plane is full, there’s only one seat remaining and we will have to reimburse you for the other seat or you’ll have to get on the next flight.’
“We were having a meltdown at this point. There was no compassion or care whatsoever. After going back and forth we said we’re not going to take separate flights and be in separate countries for hours. We said we wanted to get on the next flight together. They said ‘you can do that, we will fully reimburse both tickets and put you on the next flight for free’.”
Scott claimed that when they went down to the booking desk, one of the tickets was put down as missed flight, meaning they had to pay for one seat on a new plane.
The couple claimed they had to fork out another £100 for the new ticket and waited around four hours to board the next flight to Palma. The ‘angry’ holidaymaker claims the experience felt like discrimination as he felt the couple got singled out for being young and without kids.
Scott said he will now avoid flying with Ryanair due to the staff’s lack of compassion and empathy. While a Ryanair staff member reportedly told the couple that a refund would be processed for one of the tickets, Scott claims he has still not received it or heard from the company.
He said: “Ryanair should have asked all passengers if anyone would like to volunteer their seats. It felt like discrimination, how do they pick out these people, is it because we’re young and we have no kids so there’s just two of us, is it to do with something we don’t see or understand.
“There was so much of it that was really frustrating, and it’s the lack of care, no empathy. You can be bawling your eyes out and they just don’t care, they’re deadpan. We had to go through check-in again and we had another four and a half hours until the next flight. We paid around £100.
“We just had to get over what happened, it was a terrible way to start a holiday. They said at ticket sales they would be doing this themselves and get everything over and start the process so I haven’t formally complained. I don’t think they did, I definitely haven’t got the money back.
“We just got caught in a big company’s terms and conditions. The biggest stress was at the gate when they said we aren’t going on this flight.
When Scott shared his ordeal on social media, many were shocked to hear that airlines might overbook a flight – though some suggested reserving a seat can help avoid being ‘singled out’ for not getting aboard.
One said: “Prepay for a seat, then problem solved. ALL airlines do this.” When someone suggested queuing early to ensure you get a seat, another responded: “Or just book your seat [laughing emoji].”
Airlines tend to overbook flights as not all passengers turn up on the day. When a flight is so overbooked that passengers are denied boarding or offloaded, the airline will usually ask for volunteers. But if no-one comes forward, each airline will deny boarding to passengers in line with its own policies.
Your chances of being bumped may be increased if if you’re travelling alone or without luggage, have paid the lowest fare or were the last to check-in. Airlines are legally obliged to pay you compensation if they deny you boarding or bump you from a flight because they’ve overbooked it.
