Upon first glance, this new house occupying a tree-canopied corner in Houston is a study in simplicity. Its clean roofline caps the striking structure, which features metal-framed windows set into crisp-white walls. However, closer inspection reveals nuance: from the subtle dimension of the slurried brick façade to the graceful curve of the front wooden door. “We’re big believers in taking cues from our surroundings,” says Wimmel Design & Construction architect Roxanne Wimmel, who worked alongside her husband, builder Jonathan Wimmel, to offer turnkey architecture, interior design and construction services for these owners. “We wanted to acknowledge the fabric of the neighborhood.”
First developed nearly a century ago, the enclave was originally filled with bungalows. Though most of those dwellings have long since been replaced, their classic style continues to influence the designs taking shape today—this house being no exception. The Wimmels collaborated on its architectural design, with Roxanne overseeing the interiors and Jonathan the construction. To achieve the square footage required for this family—which grew from four to five members during construction—they stretched the design down the length of the property. They then oriented the main floor living spaces toward a side yard that’s shielded from the street by a low brick wall. “Because there’s not a house on the other side of that wall, a lot of natural light floods in,” Roxanne explains. This gave the interiors a sunny disposition that caters to both owners’ aesthetics, with the husband leaning more contemporary and the wife more traditional.
Experts at drawing inspiration from clients and filtering that information through their own lens, the Wimmels strived to merge the husband’s and wife’s respective styles. “You’ll see clean, contemporary details in our work, but we soften those elements with raw, natural materials as much as possible,” Roxanne explains. The unassuming nature of those finishes—and their seamless integration into a more modern envelope—often requires meticulous craftsmanship, Jonathan notes: “There’s a higher level of knowledge and attention required to execute the details.” Nowhere is this more evident than in the kitchen, where the edge of a quartzite countertop curves down to rest flush atop plain-sawn white oak cabinetry. An expanse of handmade zellige tile, meanwhile, seems to disappear behind a custom hood’s beam of reclaimed wood. On the back wall of the adjacent bar, two slabs of limestone meet not at a straight joint, but at a stylized zipper seam that contrasts against the stone’s brushed finish and chiseled edges.
Cobblestone pavers on the front porch and veranda, as well as in the laundry and mud rooms, have an equally rough-and-tumble quality. “I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel in every space, so a lot of materials are repeated throughout the house but in different ways,” Roxanne says. In the powder room, the dimensions of the aforementioned floor tiles were retained, but the stone—a charcoal marble—is different and dressy enough to complement an elegant vanity sculpted from slabs of violet-streaked marble. In the primary bathroom, which required larger tiles to match the scale of a massive marble-encased tub, Roxanne had reclaimed limestone laid in a French pattern, a fluid arrangement that works with reeded-front cabinets and plaster walls to temper the rigidity of the mitered-edge vanity.
From that room’s soothing gray finishes to the dark gray-bronze of the study’s walls, the colors employed throughout the home create a natural and warm palette that’s emphasized by the patina of vintage furnishings “that have lost a little bit of that newness,” Roxanne notes. The living room’s classic Fritz Hansen club chairs, for instance, had been inviting relaxation for decades before she updated them with a coat of plush shearling. A Guillerme et Chambron ottoman, reinvigorated with yellow alpaca upholstery, “has a 50-year-old finish on its wooden legs,” she adds. The dining room’s French midcentury chairs, primary suite’s timeworn Japanese bench, and cotton-candy-colored bunkroom’s vintage Turkish rag rug underscore a collected-over-time feel. “We made sure to find as many antique pieces as possible to balance everything else feeling so fresh,” the wife explains.
Grounded in its materiality, the beauty of each space is indisputable. “Our styles may have started off quite differently,” the wife continues as she reflects on her and her husband’s individual preferences. “But over time”—and as the design of their new home has worked its quiet magic—“they have merged into an elegance that suits us perfectly.”
