Main House Front

Main House Rear (note 3rd floor)

Guest House

(This house looks better in person than the pictures posted. Drive by or schedule a visit to really see it.)

For the exteriors of this house, our initial thinking was to have it as grand as we could to justify the high cost of building in University Park. But with this house to be the largest on its block by a wide margin, we didn't want the house to stick out like a sore thumb as new constructions usually do in the area. We wanted to diffuse the house's large mass and to have an understated look to blend in with the setting as opposed to needlessly overpower it.

Our solution was to base the design on a 1930's shingle and brick Colonial Revival style. The half-brick half-shingle combo is a great look in itself but it also helps to break the house's mass vertically to reduce the visual impact. We went further to have a front cross-gable and recessed the porte-cochere to break the mass horizontally as well. The resulting house, though still large, has a visual lightness to blend in nicely with its setting.

The cedar shingles were surprisingly expensive (~50% than bricks in DFW area). We nearly canceled the shingles during construction but glad we didn't. They compliment the bricks just great and give the house a distinct look. The shingles should last at least 70 years. If you drive to the 4600 block of Lorraine Av. in Highland Park, you'll see 1930's houses with their original shingles still looking good. The shingles do need to be repainted every 8-10 years. It's an added cost but it's also an opportunity to keep the house fresh with the future trends, where you can change the shingle's color from warm to cool, light to dark, to suit future preferences.

On the other hand, the remainder of the exterior is geared for minimal care. The well designed LeafGuard rain gutter is guaranteed to never clog. The guarantee is life-time and transferable. If the rain gutters ever get clogged LeafGuard will come out to clean them for you. With mature trees all around, you'll be glad to not having to ladder up or to hire someone to clean the rain gutters each fall. The picket fence is  made of  vinyl so you don't have to worry about it getting wet from watering the flowers. We also chose a vinyl cladded wood window made by Andersen to avoid the painting and caulking hassles. The landscaping was designed to allow natural growth to avoid frequent   trimming and maintenance.

As for the overall design, we wanted this house to have an enduring appeal. Something years from now people won't be able to guess which decade it was built in. Our approach was to use historically correct architectural elements and to pay extra attention to the overall form for an understatedly elegant house.

Using 3D CAD simulation to get the exterior form just right we also spent a lot of time fine tuning the house to reflect the restraint and lightness valued by University Park's first builders. The front entry for example, instead of a grandiose portico, we opted for fine millwork and a picket-fenced perennial garden to provide visitors a welcoming transition from the busy street.  As for the residents, the transition is going through the porte-cochere and having the motorized iron gate open up for a wonderful welcome-home effect.

We also bit the bullet on construction costs to build a nice guest house. Visitors often say it's the best guest house they've seen. We just don't get tired of using and looking at it. The guest house's second floor spaces under the steep roofs are just beautiful. If we didn't have kids, I'd prefer to live in the guest house.

The resulting house is classically elegant without the heavy-handed grandiosity of the recent years. We get lots of compliments on the looks of this house. It seems to strike a different cord with each visitor. Some say it's elegant, some say it's homey, refresing, even cute. But the compliment I enjoy most is when people mistakenly think we've remodeled a grand old house. It confirms we were able to capture some of University Park's elusive old house magic after all.

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