A few years back, we hired this "Renaissance Man" (yeah, right) to fix some problems with a wooden balcony. What a complete and total jerk. Here is what happened: He agreed to do certain work for $1500, with a written contract. He had looked at the balcony and knew what he was getting into. Right after the contract was signed, he dragged his feet, made excuses why he couldn't do what he promised, made some allusions that perhaps we were "mistaken" as to the work involved (even thought the written agreement was quite detailed), and then he tried to DOUBLE the price. My wife was understandably taken aback by his behavior, and rightfully - and politely - asked for our deposit back. Nope. Not Mr. Diele. This miscreant refused to do any work that the contract specified, kept the deposit ($750), and refused to give it back. He even sent us an email in which he tried to say it was all our fault, and threatened to sue us for the remaining $750! Get a load of this: He wrote: "Therefore she is the one who is in breach of contract - not me - and under said provisions I retain the right to pursue the collection of the balance as set forth in the contract, in addition to seeking damages for more than a few flagrant violations of tortious interference with contractual arrangements." When I asked him what law school he went to, he refused to tell me. This guy is, in my opinion, a "bad apple" in the barrel of Los Angeles contractors. Avoid. read more

I have a 1920's California ship-lap-sided bungalow which presented a vexing design challenge - previous owners had built room extensions onto the front of the house, cladding the addition with stucco and installing aluminum sliding windows. To this they'd added the wrong front door, the wrong step-railing, and wrong attic vents, destroying its vintage design aesthetic and whatever curb appeal our old house once had. When I called John Diele to consult with me on a restoration, I got way more than I expected! His website does show his creativity and expertise in restoring old houses, but I was surprised at his immediate grasp of how to approach our project, what should be done, and how to do it. He saw that we could solve the bulk of our design problem with vintage-milled wood siding to replace the stucco, and use restored bungalow windows to replace the awful aluminum ones. His confidence and ability to relay a vision for our restoration no doubt comes from years of experience in dealing with old homes. But he has even more to offer, I discovered: he has access to vintage doors and windows, hardware and even the hard-to-find wood siding milled to correct proportions, at very good prices. But if I had to choose, I think the best part is John's ability to think creatively. Not just what style of windows, for example, but their proportions, and even exact details of construction. Buy a new "vintage look" front door? Why do that when John can find you an original bungalow door with vintage hardware, at a cheaper price? Our front entrance porch had an ugly early-70's wrought iron handrail on steps down to a side driveway that wrecked the entire approach - it didn't look inviting, as though it expected you would only enter from the side, not the front. John agreed, and right on the spot he came up with an elegant solution - remove the handrail, add steps to the front, and add back a combined handrail from both the side and front steps that met at the top. Now there's a pleasant approach from the front as well as the useful approach from the driveway. All done inexpensively, with just the cost of two concrete steps and a small amount of vintage-style wrought iron. John was not only generous with his time, he gave us an all-inclusive itemized bid with a very reasonable price. Besides his obvious intelligence and old-school ethics, John is both an interesting guy and kind of inspiring to work with. If you get him started on a project, like me, you may find yourself thinking of all those other things you want to do to the house! John's business card is no exaggeration, he really is a renaissance man at restoration. read more

This contractor did an unacceptable job restoring my Altadena cottage in 2015. Make that 2015-2017; once begun, the work proceeded at a glacial pace. Once the stucco siding was removed from my house and garage, framing repairs continued off and on for months. Plastic sheeting was the only protection provided during two winters - and by the end of 2017, this contractor stopped showing up or returning my calls. He had failed to take out County building permits at the beginning of the work. When caught with unpermitted framing repairs by the county midway through the project, this shyster was unable to obtain a workable building permit. My husband and I were out of money. We ended up taking out a bank loan, requiring me to take out a second job to make the payments. In 2018, we finally found a wonderful contractor who repaired Renaissance Man's substandard work, with the assistance of an engineer, an architect and thousands of dollars. Which we borrowed from family and payed back by refinancing our mortgage. Renaissance Man died in January, 2019. So he won't be ripping any one else off. Most of the glowing reviews you see here he wrote himself. HIS RESPONSE, which follows this review, popped automatically after I posted my update! Yes, I did write the first review as the work was being done, at his request. I removed it in 2017 when he walked off the job. I am complaining to Yelp. He must have had that rebuttal lying in wait. read more

I have a beautiful home in Arcadia that was built in 1937 that had some water damage and rot issues. I was very much concerned and called several contractors. They all wanted me to do major work that would have destroyed the history of the house, and one even told me I should tear it down. John was nice enough to come out in the rain and on a Sunday. He carefully looked at what I thought were major problems and assured me that most of them were cosmetic and nothing to worry about - and those that needed attention could be easily be fixed without destroying anything. He arrived on time while the other contractors were late or didn't even show up. He could have tried to talk me into a lot of work like the other contractors did, but he didn't. He was very honest (hard to find in a contractor) and professional. He was also very nice. I wanted to pay him for his time but he wouldn't let me, saying that his payment was knowing that he took the stress off of me and that he saved another house. The headache I had for days immediately vanished, and for that alone I am thankful. Renaissance Man Restoration is the best! read more

A highly qualified old house specialist whose knowledge is extensive and attention to detail is unlike any contractor we have hired in the past. We purchased an historic craftsman home in Pasadena that we wanted to restore to it's original charm. We called several contractors who either didn't bother to show up or knew nothing about restoring a vintage home. We were then lucky enough to have a friend recommend John who was everything we were looking for. He was very personable and professional and we were absolutely delighted with the end results. John has a great team of licensed subcontractors who are the best in their trades and under John's supervision the results were fantastic. As the job progressed we made some changes to the original plan and John did a great job of keeping things on schedule and within budget. We highly recommend Renaissance Man Restoration. read more

We didn't know who to turn to as all the contractors we called had no idea what we were talking about. But we found Renaissance Man Restoration on the Pasadena Heritage online referral list and what a relief! Finally someone knows about historic houses and has the sensitivity and foresight to handle literally anything that was on our long list of things to do. He has instantaneous knowledge of everything and guided us through the entire process, while being extremely patient with us constantly asking him a lot of questions. He came up with a lot of new ideas and alternatives to some others as needed, and turned down a lot of work that he easily could have insisted was necessary. It was refreshing to simply talk to him. We give him the highest recommendation to anyone who needs that special someone to understand their old house. Five stars. read more

Renaissance Man Restoration was recommended by a realtor as the only company to contact for the exterior restoration of our 1909 Craftsman in Burbank and a 1921 California Bungalow in Pasadena. Both had suffered from years of neglect by previous owners who either didn't do anything at all, or hired the wrong people resulting in a horrible job - which makes it even more difficult to correct. He arrived exactly on time for our initial meeting, which was important to us as we are very busy and the proper use of our time is essential. Other contractors we had contacted either were horribly late without even a phone call, or never even came at all. John was extremely personable and offered us practical solutions to the work that needed to be done. He had a vision of what the end result would be, which was far beyond what we had imagined - he also had a full understanding of the history of the properties and exactly how to proceed to obtain the desired results. A very concise and extremely detailed bid was then offered which was quickly accepted. He is impressively knowledgeable in all trades as having had personally done them in his long career, and is very hands-on and supervises every aspect of the work - which is done by his team of the absolute best licensed sub-contractors in their respective fields, and the quality of their work was unsurpassed, and all of them worked well together. John is also extremely detail oriented and never cuts corners, which makes the final product even more perfect than it would have been otherwise. The choice of appropriate historic colors that he suggested was wonderful and only added to the incredible quality of the project. Neighbors and friends have all commented on the radical transformation of our properties and how beautiful our homes are. John also has an excellent relationship with the various building departments, who apparently recognize him as always conducting himself in the highest professional manner while also respecting the excellent quality of his work. Our rough-in inspection was immediately passed in each case and on the first visit, with the final inspection being a repeat of the first. We have been told by many people that this never happens - but it did with John - and that allowed the project to proceed smoothly, on schedule, and without any unnecessary headaches. We can't say enough complimentary things about John and his many talents. He is exactly what the serious homeowner needs to perform any work that may be required. Many thanks to Renaissance Man Restoration for a job well done! He is very highly recommended - with a full five star rating on everything. read more

Tremendous thanks for your help, Mr. Diele. I needed to re-do the bathroom in my late father's house, which was a mess and hadn't been touched since the 1970s. The house was built in 1907 and I wanted it restored to what it was. Since my father was very particular, I looked around for someone I could trust and called a few companies to get an idea of how much they'd charge. Mr. Diele said he'd come out to give me an estimate with no obligation. He came in 100 degree heat to just to have a look. SO, I thought this is the kind guy my dad would have been impressed with. He works with painstaking attention to detail and I can not recommend him enough. Thanks again. read more

Waste of time and money. Save yourself and your wallet. I called him for a consultation. We were already in the middle of our construction project on our 100+ year-old home, and I wanted a second opinion on some historical issues. He wanted to charge me $500, part of which could be applied to future services he would provide. I told him we already had a contractor and, therefore, would not be hiring him. Still, I believe in paying people for their time and wanted to pay him a consultation fee. I should have stopped there. I managed to talk him down to $250 for the consultation fee, which he said was "barely worth his time and 35 years worth of experience." Well, he showed up to the meeting, and proceeded to tell me that what we were doing was fine. Then he blathered on about a bunch of stuff we already knew about our house. He would say, "I bet you didn't know that!" Even though we either a.) already knew, or b.) didn't care because it was completely irrelevant information. He couldn't even give me any reasonable ideas at all about the issue I had called him about! Perhaps Renaissance Man is used to dealing with people who don't know the first thing about old houses, but if you have any sense in your brain at all, you don't need his input. read more