Alice Cottrell's Soothing Interiors for a Client

On the first level, the master-bedroom wallpaper is Fornasetti from Lee Jofa/ Brunschwig et Fils. Peacock Alley bedding. Kent Coffey side table from James McInroe. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

It’s a few days into Dallas’ stay-at-home order, and Tammie Kleinmann is ensconced in her first-floor bedroom, tapping away on her MacBook. She’s the owner of Lucky Post, a studio that edits television commercials; for the foreseeable future, the first level of this Knox-Henderson townhouse will serve as command central for her work. It’s hard to imagine a more rejuvenating temporary office during a crisis, with rooms drenched in light and filled with art.

“I look around this beautiful home, and it’s such a healing environment,” she says.

 

(Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Her family is holed up with her, and while it’s soothing to have loved ones around, the townhouse is quite narrow, and they would be stepping on each other if it weren’t for the three-story layout. Her husband, Brian Nadurak, an art director at the Richards Group, does his work in the kitchen on the second floor, while Kleinmann’s daughter, Sydney, has returned from college and is finishing her classwork online from her bedroom on the third floor.

They moved into this townhouse in 2018 from a rambling O’Neil Ford-designed residence in Preston Hollow. “When we were thinking about downsizing, we really hesitated with all the stairs,” Kleinmann says. “But now I’m like, ‘Thank God for the multilevels and the stairs.’ In the mornings, we all have coffee together and then head to our respective floors.” 

Designed by Dallas architect Lionel Morrison in 1999, the townhouse is luminous with white walls, polished concrete floors, and sparkling courtyard views. Morrison’s firm was among the first to introduce beautifully executed white-box minimalism to Dallas in the late 1980s and early ’90s. His austere, reductionist designs are deceptively simple yet dynamic with complex interactions of volumes and voids. Signature design elements include floating walls and uninterrupted planes of natural materials. 

There are four Morrison-designed townhouses on Kleinmann’s block, but hers is the only one that has never been renovated. Except for a fresh coat of paint, it’s in pristine original condition, including the granite countertops in the kitchen. Granite was a cutting-edge material 20 years ago, and although it’s now considered dated, she has no plans to replace it. “I wanted to embrace the house just the way it is,” she says. “I dreamed of living in a classic modern house like this, and I finally did.” 

Interior designer Alice Cottrell and Tammie Kleinmann have been friends for decades, and they’ve worked on a half-dozen projects together, including this townhouse and the interiors for the Lucky Post offices, located two minutes away. In all, Kleinmann has lived in 16 or 17 homes over the past 20 years, many of them rescues and redos, including a historic 1908 Prairie-style house in Highland Park, one of the oldest remaining structures in the Park Cities. Kleinmann and her first husband lived in the O’Neil Ford-designed house for 10 years, a long-term restoration project and the longest she’s stayed anywhere.

Her motivation isn’t to flip houses for profit, she insists, but to create something nurturing and beautiful, then move on. She has no plans to move again any time soon, but the itch to create something new recently prompted her to buy an old cottage near Knox-Henderson, which she plans to fix up and possibly rent. Her husband, who loves to paint, is currently using it as an art studio.

Redoing the townhouse was like running a well-oiled machine. “Tammie is a dream client, and you can put that in bold letters,” Cottrell says. “We have a great history and camaraderie, and I rarely have to show her options. She loves everything we choose.”

The TV area on the second floor of the Knox-Henderson townhouse includes a T.H. Robsjohn-Gibbings chair from Sputnik Modern. Holly Hunt floor lamp. Brian Nadurak painting. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Design’s Impact on Your Mood  

For this project, Cottrell also enlisted the help of designer Gary Hatch and Steven Hauser Construction. They used much of Kleinmann’s existing furniture, along with a handful of new pieces and custom sofas. Cottrell employed a few design tricks to create cohesiveness throughout, such as using the same neutral-tone rugs in every room and covering seating in adjacent rooms in similar fabrics, though in different colors. Walls were repainted in Benjamin Moore Chantilly Lace, creating a soft white backdrop. 

Cottrell used unconventional wallpapers to break up the white and create focal points. In the entry, a floating wall next to the grand piano is covered in Flavor Paper Vigilant Floral. At first glance, it looks like traditional floral wallpaper; upon closer inspection, we see that it also includes birds perched on razor wire and vines entwined around digital surveillance cameras. In the master bedroom, Fornasetti’s classic wallpaper Nuvole al Tramonto features atmospheric etchings of billowing clouds and sets a peaceful tone. 

“I wake up and immediately feel good in such a beautiful room,” Kleinmann says. “Design is important, because it can affect your whole outlook.”At the end of the workday, she joins her husband on the second-floor living room for a glass of wine. Two brightly patterned B&B Italia lounge chairs, which have endured through four previous houses, have been dubbed therapy chairs because they’re where the couple relaxes and swaps stories. Inevitably, the talk of late turns to the effects of the COVID-19 crisis. “We have a roof over our heads, but not everyone does,” Kleinmann says. “I go to Whole Foods, but not everyone has money for groceries. My husband and I are struggling with what we have and others don’t. It’s hard to accept that reality.”

 

In the entry, Edward Fields carpet. Sculptures in the courtyard and entry are by Elliot Eames Saarinen. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Wallpaper by Flavor Paper. Stool is upholstered in shagreen-embossed platinum leather by Garrett Leather from EC Dicken. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

In the second-level living area, sofas from A. Rudin are customized with Romo plaid velvet. B&B Italia chairs covered in Paul Smith fabric by Maharam. Stark rug. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

 

(Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

(Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Granite was a cutting-edge material 20 years ago, and although it’s now considered dated, the homeowner has no plans to replace it. “I wanted to embrace the house just the way it is.” (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Kitchen cabinet from Smink holds Kleinmann’s glass collection. Design within Reach stools. Kristina Girke painting, Galerie Christian Schindler, Darmstadt, Germany. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

On the second level, the dining-room table and chairs are B&B Italia. Collection of sterling candlesticks, curated by Russell Brightwell, includes designs by Richard Meier. (Photo by Stephen Karlisch)

Story by Rebecca Sherman. Photography by Stephen Karlisch. Interior design by Alice Cottrell. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Flowers by Crisman Liverman.

This story originally ran in the May 2020 issue of PaperCity.

Joshua Rice's Zen Retreat for Leatherology Founder Rae Liu

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

In 2014,  Rae Liu and her husband, Kurt Johnson, were living in a high-rise, planning a wedding and a family. The search was on for a house to kick off their new

life together. “I felt strongly about finding a modern home that was a space we could grow into,” says Liu, co-owner of Dallas–based Leatherology, an online direct-to-consumer collection of personalized leather goods. Johnson is a banker, with a penchant for woodworking; he crafted their sleek dining-room table as a wedding gift for Liu.

The couple discovered their ideal house tucked among the trees near Royal Lane, in a neighborhood of 1960s modern classics. “We walked in and immediately said, ‘Yes!’” Liu says. Light flooded through floor-to-ceiling windows in every room, yet the house felt private — an oasis lush with pecan trees and cherry laurels. An avid gardener, Liu hired noted landscape architect Michael Kinler to create an enclosed garden and entertaining area.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Not a mere white box, this modern house has pitched ceilings and wood beams that provide rooms with ample architectural interest. Polished-concrete and wood floors, added by the previous owners, were beautiful enough to keep. But the living and dining areas were fused into one long space that proved awkward to furnish and use. And while the couple both like a modern aesthetic, Johnson leans a little more toward traditional. The answer was to enlist the help of an interior designer to create more usable spaces and blend the couple’s design styles. Liu’s brother and co-owner of Leatherology, David Liu Jr., introduced them to Joshua Rice, a designer known for a sophisticated, meticulously curated look that is still comfortable and approachable. “We both liked his work right off,” Liu says. “It was a nice bridge between both our styles.” 

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

When Rice looked at the images of the house Liu e-mailed him, he recognized it. The previous homeowners were clients of his, and they had hired him to help with the interiors. The job had stalled when the clients moved out of town, but the happy coincidence turned out to be an advantage. “I had two years to think about that house and what worked and what didn’t,” Rice says. The beautiful natural light was a plus, so he designed each room to take full advantage. But as Liu and Johnson already knew, the living and dining areas merged awkwardly, with no clear definition of spaces. As a remedy, Rice commissioned a steel tension-rod shelving system to act as a room divider and configured it to hold books and decorative items. A young Brazilian furniture maker, Jader Almeida for Sollos, was tapped for the project and went on to produce other furnishings for the house. A fireplace, which was oddly placed along one wall in the TV room, was replaced with a floating black-ribbed steel rectangle of Rice’s design. “We simplified anything that was distracting and made the house appear more minimal,” Rice says. “That allowed us to focus on the interior design.” 

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Two children have come along since Johnson and Liu purchased their modern house four years ago. Rice, who has young kids of his own, was sensitive to creating a home that was safe and would stand up to wear and tear. “Almost everything Josh did has a rounded corner,” says Liu. “And he was able to play with silhouettes and textures to make it interesting.” Rice designed a striking round coffee table for the sitting room, which became a centerpiece for the main seating area where the family gathers to watch television. Water-cut from a slab of stone and “popped out and put together like a Happy Meal toy,” he says, the idea was born from necessity. “We needed something dramatic at a reasonable price. So I bought the prettiest piece of Brazilian quartzite I could find with a textural finish and got this very dramatic table.” Vioski’s U-shaped sectional, enticingly piled with pillows, is the perfect shape to engage with the table. Rice often uses a sumptuous Knoll Womb chair in his projects, and this one is no exception. “I try not to use things that are too ubiquitous, but it’s a hard chair to beat because it’s comfortable and looks so outstanding,” he says.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Interiors by Joshua Rice. Styling by Russell Brightwell. Photography by Robert Tsai.

Rice conceived the handsome living room as a place to enjoy a glass of wine before moving into the adjacent dining area. Like the rest of the house, it’s a collection of tonal colors and

subtle textures. A pair of rattan Poul Kjaerholm PK22 chairs is draped with sheepskin throws, and a paper Noguchi floor lamp provides plenty of design bang at a reasonable cost. Plaster-topped tables have a stained, textural finish and were handmade in Italy. Amsterdam–based interdisciplinary cooperative BCXSY designed the one-of-a-kind patchwork wool rug, which was woven by Bedouin women.

Because the walls in the house are mostly windows, the couple couldn’t hang much art. In this case, that turned out to be a good thing. “Empty walls help keep the serene feeling,” Rice says. “I tell clients there’s nothing wrong with empty walls, especially if the room has some architectural interest.” Ultimately, the refined and comfortable house works beautifully for the couple and their children. “My personal style is classic and unfussy,” Liu says. “I take a similar approach to running our business. At Leatherology we create beautifully crafted leather essentials that are meant to be timeless. Our home is a reflection of that — with the added requirement that everything in it be child-friendly. I love that Josh has helped us create a home we can live in for years."

Rae Liu and her brother David Liu, Jr. co-founded Leatherology

Historic St. Anthony in San Antonio

St. Anthony Hotel lobby

I love fascinating backstories, don't you? The historic 1909 St. Anthony Hotel's new parrot green and gold interiors were inspired by a set of china designed by Dorothy Draper, which had been long lost inside a storage room at the hotel. In the 1950s, Draper designed china for the ballrooms and the hotel’s exclusive St. Anthony Club, and a handful of pieces were discovered during its recent renovation. The inside scoop comes from Colletta Conner, an associate principal for ForrestPerkins, a design studio of Perkins Eastman, who worked on the multi-million dollar project for the hotel's new owners, The Luxury Collection from Starwood Hotels & Resorts.

The "Peacock Alley" lobby area, added in 1930,
includes an original 1927 Steinway grand piano

Lobby detail

Shades of gray throughout the hotel give Draper’s jewel tones a sophisticated edge, Conner told me. The St. Anthony’s 107-year-old footprint remains intact and public spaces have been returned to their original grandeur, including Peacock Alley, built circa 1930 as a lounge and bar overlooking Travis Park, where San Antonio’s chicest would once gather to see and be seen. And what a grand era it was. In its heyday, the St. Anthony drew such luminaries as Eleanor Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Princess Grace and Prince Rainier of Monaco, Fred Astaire, Judy Garland and John Wayne. And, for the past 75 years the hotel has hosted coming-out balls for Fiesta debutants, as a part of the city’s most celebrated event. 

Grand staircase in the lobby

While most of the new furnishings are custom, an edited selection of antiques were kept and restored, such as a pair of gilt, carved 18th century settees and a 1927 Steinway, which was returned to Peacock Alley. All of the hotel’s original artwork was rehung, along with historic photographs of famous patrons and gloriously gowned Fiesta debs. 

Light-filled dining room off the lobby

 Constructed by a trio of Texas cattle barons, the 10-story St. Anthony was so technologically advanced that it was considered one of the world’s most modern hotels, featuring doors that opened automatically and electric lights that turned off when guests locked their hotel room doors. Newly upgraded with all of the technology you’d expect and just three blocks from the Alamo and River Walk, the St. Anthony is poised to become the glittering center of San Antonio life — once again. Check more of it out here.

Patrizia Moroso's House in Italy

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Dateline Italy   Moroso just opened an amazing new store in Houston, its first Texas location. The company's creative director, Patrizia Moroso, is one of the most innovative talents in the furniture business, teaming up with artists and architects such as Ron Arad and Patricia Urquiola to create designs. In the course of writing about her new store, I had a chance to talk to her by phone from her new house in Udine, Italy, where her family's 60-year-old business is based. She loves to talk about furniture design, but it's her house that gets her most excited. Designed by Urquiola — the Spanish architect who has been Moroso's best friend for ages — the house is set inside a wild, abandoned garden, which she's left intact. “When I saw it, I called Patricia right away and told her I wanted her to design a house for me," she says. "I wanted to feel like I was living in the garden."

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Moroso wanted the house to disappear into its wooded setting, so Urquiola clad the 10,000 square foot abode in cedar with a black painted roof, which Moroso likens to tree bark after a rain. Windows and doors are painted oxblood red, “like the leaves,” she adds. The black and red palette is Moroso’s favorite, and the red reminds her especially of the color of the dirt in Africa, where her husband Abdou Salam Gaye is from (together they have three children). 

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

It’s an environmentally conscious house, with cork-insulated walls, solar panels and a cistern for watering plants. Inside, nature is a large part of the design scheme. “I asked Patricia to make the biggest windows possible, so that I could feel like I was living in the garden,” she says. “Many of the walls are totally glass. In summer, it’s like living in a jungle. In the winter, it’s like living in the snow.”

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

The first floor is all about hosting family and friends, whether for small gatherings or extended stays. There’s a catering kitchen, indoor pool, guest room and a Turkish bath — the Middle Eastern variant of a steam bath. The children’s playrooms are nearby and a main seating area includes furniture designed by Urquiola and contemporary Iranian rugs. A conversation pit, inspired by Gaye’s African heritage, features a red, black and oak palette, along with an oversize photograph by Boubacar Touré Mandémory, a contemporary artist included in Moroso’s “M’Afrique” exhibition for the 2009 Milan furniture fair.

Photo by Alessandro Paderni

Upstairs are the private family quarters that feature a small living room, dining room and kitchen, along with bedrooms. Urquiola corralled Moroso’s collection of one-off furniture by the designers she works with including Ron Arad, and a mis-mash of prototypes and factory rejects. “Patricia made everything clean and organized out of my mess, because I have a lot of things I love: big pictures, prototypes of furniture. Everything comes from the company. I can change out furniture anytime I want.” Inspired by modern houses from the 1950s, the interiors are “very clean, but very warm with lots of wood,” says Moroso. “In the end, Patricia did the perfect, simple house.”  moroso.it

Heritage's 20th & 21st Century Design Auction

Frank Lloyd Wright table designed for the Biltmore in Phoenix, 1927, $3,000 +

Design Greats . . . such as Frank Lloyd Wright, Frank Gehry, Le Corbusier, Florence Knoll, Gio Ponti, Arne Jacobsen, Hans Wegner and Sam Maloof will be auctioned on March 31, 2015 at Heritage's 20th & 21st Century Design Auction. If you're a fan of modern design and art, and want to see these pieces in person, the auction is a great way to experience them. Or, follow it along on the website. It's a large auction that includes seven lots devoted entirely to designs by Frank Lloyd Wright, early ceramics by David Hockney, a rare line study by Le Corbusier (with a current bid of $20,000), and exquisite pieces from the celebrated Chinese design masters of the Zizaoshe Furniture Collective. 

There's also plenty of pieces that are more attainable, such as a gorgeous silver and walnut cocktail shaker by Asprey & Co (current bid: $1,750) and enameled glass Cosmos plates from the 1950s by Maurice Heaton (currently at $300). I have to say my favorites are a pair of stainless stools by Zhang Zhoujie (below). The  more you look at their angles, the more beautiful they become.

Frank Gehry 1972 Contour lounge chair, $2,000 +

Chinese artist Sa Rina's 2011 walnut and stainless table,  $4,000 +

Zhang Zhoujie's 2012 stainless steel stools, $6,000 +

Song Tao's 2019 tea table, $4,000 +

Vasarely's 1971 op art, $70,000 +

Gensler's Dramatic Redo of Reunion Tower

The interactive GeO-deck at Reunion Tower; Photo by Andrew Bordwin

Sky High Style . . . For so long, whenever anyone visiting Dallas wanted to know where to go, I skipped telling them about Reunion Tower, even though—thanks to the TV show Dallas—it had become a landmark. Despite the amazing views from the observation deck, the interior spaces had seen better days. Then, it further fell off my radar when the tower was shut down in 2007 for renovations.

Now, just in time for its 35th anniversary, Reunion Tower is back, and it's been worth the wait. The last two remaining floors, including the new GeO-deck and Cloud Nine cafe, recently re-opened, with a dazzling redesign carried out by Dallas-based Gensler. Using the rotating sphere as inspiration, designers and architects at Gensler transformed the observation deck and cafe, using LEDs and beautiful materials and furnishings. 

They also teamed up with San Francisco-based Stimulant, a firm that specializes in the latest, state-of-the-art interactive technology. The observation deck's 360 degree view is enhanced by 46 touch screens that allow you to pull up real-time information about what you're seeing, thanks to HD cameras mounted outside the tower. The Big Sky installation on the ceiling of Cloud Nine cafe streams real-time, 3D simulations of the city's weather patterns—can you imagine what it would all look like during one of Dallas' explosive thunderstorms? 

GeO-deck LED detail; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.

LED clouds in the ceiling at the Cloud Nine cafe feature digital weather scenes; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.

Bar at Cloud Nine cafe; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.

The new high-speed elevator at Reunion Tower takes
68 seconds to reach the top; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.

Stairwell and lighting fixture connecting the GeO-deck and Cloud Nine cafe; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.

High definition cameras mounted on the exterior of the tower
allow visitors to pick a view of the city
 to explore in real time; Photo by Andrew Bordwin.