Our clients are long-time residents of the Houston Heights neighborhood. When they decided to build a new house with a home office, they began researching what kind of house that might be. While driving around Houston looking at residential architecture, they were impressed by a project that had recently been completed by our office. They asked the owner for the name of his architect, and we were commissioned.

The new building would be constructed on a site that combined two properties: a corner lot and the adjacent interior lot. Our design began by taking advantage of the corner. Situating the house so that it faced each street allowed pedestrian access by one street and vehicular access by the other. Separate entrances facing the two streets were created for the residence and business.

The plan incorporates spaces arranged in enfilade (a suite of rooms with aligning doorways). Our design provides for aligned vistas and a sense of procession through layered spaces. A continuous porch extends the interior spaces into the side yard where a pool and lawn are located. Reflecting the historic nature of the Houston Heights neighborhood, our design has American Craftsman features: a shallow roof pitch, front and side porch, roof lantern, multi-paned windows, and exposed rafter tails.

Eight years after moving into their new house, our clients purchased another adjacent piece of property. They asked us to design a separate home office for that lot. The new structure is a smaller sibling to the house, and the joined properties have become a compound. The new structure is designed as a variation on the theme of the house. The two structures are related to one another by aligning like features across the width of the site.

A layered landscape allows the two structures to maintain individuality while sharing common space. Those layers include a lawn, a swimming pool, and a pruned row of trees. A hedge running the length of the sidewalk provides privacy from the street.