BLUE ROOFS AND BLUEBLOODS; MIRAMAR HOTEL READIES FOR REFURBISHMENT THAT WILL PUT IT IN STEP WITH MONTECITO'S UPSCALE ENVIRONS.

Byline: Eric Noland Travel Editor

MONTECITO - The well-heeled residents huddle in their estates behind dense hedges, thick walls and iron gates in this self-conscious community on the southern edge of Santa Barbara. They obviously take their isolation seriously, such that when warning rabble away, they go so far as to invoke adverbs.

``Absolutely Private Property,'' reads a sign in front of one sprawling property. ``Positively No Admission,'' reads another.

There is a stridency to the admonishments. In them, you can almost detect an audible sniff. ``Not a Through Street. No Turnaround.'' (Gee, sorry my front wheels intruded on the first 30 inches of your driveway.) ``Private Road. Right to Pass by Permission.'' (And who issues that, Jarvis the butler?)

For nearly a century, Montecito has been favored by captains of industry, power players of the silver screen and vacationers desperate for solitude. It's not difficult to see why. It commands a thickly wooded slope in the foothills of the Santa Ynez Mountains, overlooking the Pacific Ocean and the Channel Islands, ambling down to a stretch of rugged, secluded beach. With sunglasses, tinted windows and determination, you could go days without ever having to speak to a soul.

For the last few decades, however, one establishment has been dreadfully out of step with all of this: the Miramar Hotel. It is undoubtedly familiar to anyone who has ever wheeled north on 101 through Santa Barbara. How could you possibly miss those blue roofs, set off dramatically by white clapboard?

The blue paint was swabbed on in 1940, precisely to catch the eye of people passing on the highway. The asphalt - covering six of the property's 13 acres - was laid down shortly after, as America took to the road in search of parking places. A two-story motel structure went up, facing away from the ocean, designed instead to maximize views of a pool and ... well, the road.

Prepare to say goodbye to all of this, though. Hotelier Ian Schrager, pioneer of cutting-edge lodgings in West Hollywood, New York and Miami Beach, spent $31.5 million to acquire this somewhat tired-looking motel two years ago. He plans to sink nearly that much more into it in a massive renovation that is expected to require a year and a half to complete. And the developers hope to start breaking ground - and breaking up asphalt - this fall.

Upon completion, the Miramar figures to be a high-end resort that enjoys much more congruity with its neighborhood, joining such properties of understated elegance as the Four Seasons Biltmore and the San Ysidro Ranch.

``The big concept will be returning it to the sensibility of the seaside resort, oriented back to the ocean,'' said Tim Andreas, design director on a project headed by Philippe Starck. ``We're restoring the landscaping and the sensibility that you're in a seaside garden setting rather than a motor court.''

If the Miramar's designation as a somewhat funky highway motel stirs any nostalgic pangs in you, this is the season to get a last taste. Its doors will be closed when the renovations - guttings, primarily - begin. When it reopens, you certainly won't find any shoulder-season room rates of $75 for a pool/highway view.

When Philip Dailey transferred here from one of Schrager's New York hotels to be general manager of the Miramar, he heard story after story of people who had fond memories of the place. They'd learned to swim in the pool as a child. Couples had honeymooned there. The bar had generated volumes of colorful lore. But he encountered something else: No one had been back for 15 or 20 years. He drew a conclusion. ``The Miramar,'' Dailey said, ``is like an old jacket you keep in your closet. You can't bring yourself to throw it away, but you never wear it either.''

The place was overripe for an upgrade. That much was evident during a recent stay there. Its rooms have bargain sheets and pillows beneath synthetic bedspreads in floral prints. The furniture and other furnishings are 1970s Holiday Inn revival. The drinking glasses are plastic. The TV sits on a cheap stand. No separate towels are provided for use at the beach or pool.

During our visit, the bathroom sink drain unleashed a four-inch gusher of dark goo when somebody turned on a tap upstairs. After this recurred minutes later, a maintenance man was summoned, but he seemed at a loss, saying, ``It's happened before.'' Then he checked to see if the shower drain had been similarly afflicted. (Yecch!)

SWEEPING CHANGES

All of this will be gone when the doors reopen. The blue roofs? They're history. The Miramar is seeking to recapture a sense of its more distant past.

In the 1870s, transplanted Englishman Josiah Doulton tried to scratch out a living here growing fruit trees and various crops for livestock feed. When his fortunes flagged in this enterprise, however, he found that accommodating travelers was much more lucrative. He dotted the lush grounds with tiny guest cottages, some of which - dating to 1901 - still stand.

The new design will seek to recapture some of these sensibilities while maximizing a 500-foot stretch of beachfront. The refurbished cottages will be engulfed by a citrus orchard in one part of the property, a field of lavender in another, Dailey said recently as he strolled over seemingly endless expanses of parking lot. The renovated motel building will feature balcony trellises cascading with bougainvillea.

The bank of rooms down by the ocean - built literally on the sand - will be something really special. Two of the current rooms will be fused into one lavish duplex. Picture a row of two-story townhouses, each with a private deck with whirlpool tub, a downstairs living room and kitchen, and a spiral staircase that climbs to a spacious upstairs bedroom.

The central feature of the resort will be a boardwalk promenade that is to stretch from the lobby to an oceanfront bar and grill. In between will be a pool, bordered on one side by a restaurant, on the other by a spa.

Schrager came up with the concept of ``hotel as theater,'' creating natural gathering areas where guests and visitors can basically congregate to watch each other. This is what is envisioned for this area, with the occasional passenger train passing through to provide a touch of surrealism.

The train tracks come with the deed here. When the Southern Pacific sought to build a north-south line through here in the mid-1880s, Doulton asked that it be routed down there along that useless, non-arable land along the beach rather than through his precious barley field farther inland. (Suntans and cutback rides on waves were not high on priority lists in that particular era.)

An old flag-stop depot still stands on the Miramar property, and it will be incorporated into the new design.

Major highways, on the other hand, are much less charming, and the 101 roars by within just a few feet of the property's inland border. To gain an appreciation for just how many goods are transported in 18-wheel trucks these days, sit by the Miramar pool for an hour or so.

Masking that rattle and hum will surely be a major challenge for the developers. The plan is to employ a sound wall, a hedge, sound-absorption building materials, triple-pane glass and, as a final resort, the white noise of waterfalls and babbling brooks.

A RIVAL FOR THE BILTMORE

When the resort is finished - the end of next year, perhaps early 2002 - the Miramar will contend for the same high-end traveler who currently gravitates to the Biltmore. In Montecito, there figures to be plenty of room for both, but it shapes up to be an intriguing contrast.

While the Miramar will target the crowd that crackles on the leading edge of trendiness, the Biltmore has built its considerable reputation on Old World elegance and deference.

It was constructed in the 1920s, Los Angeles architect Reginald Johnson employing the design of a stately Spanish villa. Although it underwent two major refurbishments in recent years, adding such upgrades as air conditioning and the requisite data ports in rooms (a spa addition is currently under construction), the Biltmore still features wrought-iron balconies shaded by tropical shrubbery, massive beam ceilings, bright interiors (cream-colored walls, white plantation shutters and ceiling fans, new bedspreads and drapes), as well as detached cottages of its own. The place feels like old money.

Which is appropriate, really, given its neighborhood. That, in fact, is one of the conditions that enhances the prospects for a reborn Miramar. Here, you don't have to worry about putting up a lavish resort and being stuck next to a hot dog-on-a-stick stand and a junky boat-repair yard.

Though an unincorporated community of only 9,300 people, Montecito is so status-conscious that it has two village areas - one it can look down its nose at as a tourist enclave, the other it can treat as a locals' hangout. The former stretches out along Coast Village Road, parallel to and virtually on top of 101. The other, referred to as Upper Village (of course), is farther upslope, clustered around the corner of East Valley Road and San Ysidro Road.

Here, few of the businesses open on Sunday, a refreshing throwback to an era when all self-respecting establishments honored the Sabbath. On days when they do open their doors, you'll find impressive home furnishings and antiques at William Laman, housed in a 100-year-old former home.

Or you might notice the sign that pointedly forbids cell-phone use in the breakfast room of the San Ysidro Pharmacy.

Or you might survey the stylish but confounding array of products in an establishment eccentrically called Pierre Lafond Wendy Foster. Walk into one room here and you'll find gourmet groceries, greeting cards, deli items and chocolates. Walk through an adjacent door and you're among racks of women's clothing. Head up the stairs for - no joke - kitchen and bath items, antique office furniture, women's lingerie, men's shirts and garden accouterments. (``Yes, I've made my selections. I'm getting this black-clay dinnerware, a linen robe, this packet of radish seeds and a bar of Pre de Provence bath soap. Sure, all in the same bag is fine.'')

EXCLUSIVE TERRITORY

It might be tempting, upon leaving the Upper Village, to explore the neighborhood. Don't bother. You can drive through Montecito, but you can't actually see Montecito. What you gaze at instead are fortresslike walls, impenetrable stands of greenery, tall fences, elaborate iron gates.

The mansions are set well back from the road at the end of winding drives. In a local real-estate flyer, one ocean-view property was going for $3.6 million - and that's just for three acres of bare dirt. If you want something with a house on it, well, here's a 15,000-square-foot Italian palazzo with formal gardens, statuary and an ocean view for a priced-to-move $12.5 million.

Montecito's old money has been suffused of late with nouveau riche - movie-industry stars and executives, high-tech entrepreneurs, etc. They are attracted by the same attributes that appeal to weekend tourists: tranquillity, clean air, cool climate, mesmerizing views of the sea.

Find all of these in abundance down along the beach. You can easily walk a considerable stretch of it, from Lookout County Park south of Montecito (take the Summerland exit off the 101) clear to the Biltmore - 2.5 miles in one direction.

Check a tide table before embarking (the Santa Barbara News-Press runs one daily) and go at low tide to avoid being pulverized on rocks or against one of several sea walls. Also, there are a number of spots in which streams rush briskly over boulders, so you might want to bring along a pair of old tennis shoes.

Out on the water, you're likely to spot pelicans skimming along the surface and diving for snacks, or bobbing in the swells like great, fish- powered frigates. Off Hammonds' Point, those are not seals in the water; they are wetsuit-clad surfers playing chicken with the offshore rocks.

This is a good stretch for beach walking because the lords and ladies of the palatial manors that abut it tend to be reclusive sorts - and in some cases, absentee owners. As a result, the foot traffic is not particularly heavy, and it's virtually nil on weekdays.

You likely will encounter dogs, though. Lot of dogs. Although a deputy at the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department said there is a leash law on the books, it's clear that it is obstinately ignored here. The hounds roam with such impunity that sometimes it's difficult to match up the pets with the owners, even for sport.

The packs race up and down the sand, dashing into the surf, chasing nothing in particular, slobbering on lone walkers ... seeming to single out the beach in front of the Miramar as their own private comfort station.

Maybe once the townhouse suites and the beach grill go in and that shabby throwback motel is finally transformed, they'll begin to exhibit a bit more decorum.

IF YOU GO

GETTING THERE: Montecito lies immediately south of Santa Barbara, about a 90-mile drive from Los Angeles via U.S. 101.

LODGING: Published rates for rooms at the Four Seasons Biltmore Resort start at $420 for a standard room. Deluxe rooms in a cottage setting are particularly popular; they start at $465. Packages are offered, with the greatest savings available from Sunday through Thursday. Phone: [phone]. Reservations: [phone]. Web: www.fourseasons.com/santabarbara. At the Miramar, rates in high season (today through the summer) range from $139 for a poolside room to $329 for oceanfront. Cottages range from $319 (one bedroom) to $619 (three-bedroom). Suites with kitchenettes are available - $839 for an oceanfront unit. Phone: [phone]. Reservations: [phone]. Web: www.sbmiramar.com.

DINING: Perhaps the best dinner option in Montecito is Pane e Vino, a trattoria in the Upper Village (1482 East Valley Road). It offers about a dozen pasta dishes priced just under $10. The best breakfast in town is at Tutti's, in the Lower Village (1209 Coast Village Road). The Biltmore's patio is tough to beat for a lunch setting, especially if the marine layer has lifted.

INFORMATION: The Santa Barbara Visitors Bureau can provide tourist information on Montecito. Phone: [phone]. Web: www.santabarbaraCA.com.

CAPTION(S):

5 photos, map, box

Photo:

(1 -- 4 -- color) The lush greenery mof the Four Seasons Biltmore blend well with Montecito's elegant environs. The Miramar plans a major refurbishment to join the club, a project that will involve renovations of century-old cottages. Montecito has two areas for congregating, Coast Village Road and the sidewalk cafes of the Upper Village.

(5) Richard Southard paints ocean landscapes on the boardwalk at Butterfly Beach in status-conscious Montecito, where the Miramar Hotel is being transformed into a posh resort.

Michael Owen Baker/Staff Photographer

Box: IF YOU GO (see text)

Map: MONTECITO

Reuben J. Stern/Staff Artist