This week’s Neighborhood Guessing Game is on! Do you know where this home is?
If you do, see the next paragraph for some specific instructions. If you don’t, why not make a guess? If you guess correctly you can win a great prize from the Rice Design Alliance: a one-year individual RDA membership! (If more than one person guesses the correct neighborhood, the prize goes to the player who provided the best explanation for the guess.)
Seen this place before? Great — please don’t spoil the game for everyone else by posting the answer. Instead, send Swamplot a link to the listing (so we’re clued in). Then post an incorrect guess — but make it sound believable! If you do this well, you’ll get special recognition when the answer is revealed. And if no other player comes up with the right neighborhood, you could win the prize!
Ready for a better look at this place? Go ahead, take a poke around:
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Well, the answer should be pretty clear by now. Shouldn’t it?
Gotta make up your mind! Your guesses go in the comments below. The answer appears here . . . on Thursday!
Update, 10/22: The answer has appeared here!
- This week’s prize sponsor: Rice Design Alliance
Photos: HAR
Great white hunter seeks sassy female for fun times. Must have large caliber weapons and love the thrill of the hunt. Please send pictures of weapons.
Jaysus, what a wacky place. I’m guessing South of Memorial Drive between Post Oak and Voss.
Hunters Creek, obviously.
Sweet Jesus! That’s a big house with a lot of expensive (though tacky) stuff in it. Piney Point?
Good lord… a Katy mega-mansion.
Memorial and Dairy Ashford. Do the heads come with the house.
You cannot “hide” from the fact that this must be in Crestwood/Glen Cove.
Definately one of those places in magnolia where the developer is selling 1-4 acre lots so you can build the place of your dreams. This was apparently someone’s dream.
Kingwood.
straight outta Sugar Land.
Palm Royale Drive.
Lordy. Even the chandeliers and candelabra are antlers. A feminine touch is nowhere to be seen. Grand curving staircase, lots of big rooms, marble entry, fancy ceiling tricks, and the usual nouveau riche architectural blah blah blah, plus tall trees outside… This man’s manly mansion is recent construction somewhere in the northern reaches of Tanglewood near Buffalo Bayou. Not quite Heart of Darkness but close enough for bwana to get to his Post Oak consulting firm office without wasting valuable time that could be better spent planning the next trophy-shooting safari.
There are not nearly enough pillows on the beds. And what’s up with the easy chairs in the gym area? I mean, do you work out and then go sit on the upholstered furniture and get it all sweaty?
The views out the window feel like it backs up to the bayou somewhere off of Memorial Drive near Voss.
My guess is Tomball, somewhere around Willowbrook mall on a huge lot. Is that a Koala skin draped over the arm chair in the den?
Now Matt I’m supposed to be Matt. You’re supposed to be matt. Who shall I be? I guess I will be Matt Mystery. Done. But off with your head just the same.
Some of the guesses are good but there’s too much land so my guess is Tanglewood and because there aren’t a lot of trees I will guess in Tanglewood proper along the boulevard. It has that Tanglewood aura – the oilman who loves to hunt and display it all. The wives of course always love it all. Just as long as he keeps paying the Needless-Markup bill each month.
And on second glance, I still say Tanglewood. The treatments. Some expensive. Some not. Typical in Tanglewood. But it just screams “Yeeeeeeeeee doggies, Grannie, we’re rich.” like only a house in Tanglewood can. Is there a cement pond as well?
Again I look at the kitchen. Most don’t utilize the fur-down area and either get rid of it and use it as a shelf for tacky plants or they use it for the ac/heat venting. These people entertain a lot so the big stuff goes up high. On level three. There is that single side-by-side. but I bet somewhere there are one or two huge freezers. Lots of duck and venison and all sorts of goodies for the Sunday afternoon bar-beeeeeee-queeeeees during the summer. Lots of beer kegs too. Around the cement pond.
Land ‘O Sugar!
And just how many leather couches & chairs are there in this place, anyway? Jeez.
I think Miz Brooke Smith nailed it but I am gonna try and one up her and go with Indian Trail (the area along the Buffalo Bayou right off of Chimney Rock). I bet this house was built in the late 1970s either backing up to the bayou or a ravine long before Chimney Rock was widened and the bridge was built. My guess is the guy went to Kinkaid and joined SAE and now has a share in a hunting property where he can bag his trophies. He bagged his trophy wife at a different locale though.
All the wild animals live in the woods — these poor dead creatures now reside in The WoodLands. Sigh. This place gives me the creeps.
With all that in your face elegance, it has to be either in Rivercrest down the street from Hubert Vo’s little house, or up in Augusta Pines. If it’s the latter, it’s probably a foreclosure or shares a cul-de-sac with one……..
Looks like a ravine lot in River Oaks to me, that would explain all the big windows. One of those late 80s new-construction McMansions over there around, or just west of, Willowick. Of course they didn’t call them McMansions back then. Might be in Homewoods or Tall Timbers, too. Finishes aren’t nearly as ostentatious as they would have been twenty years later. Still, these folks have some serious coin, no doubt about it.
Mt. Belvieu, enough said.
Ugh. Where is PETA when you need them? Makes me want to become a vegetarian. Out on the prarie in Katy somewhere. I’ll guess Cinco Ranch, cause that’s the only prarie place I know.
The floors and windows tell me this not a “more upscale” home…I think
I agree with Sugar Land. Sweetwater?
City of Bellaire.
This looks like one of the “self-affirming” swankiendas I’ve seen along the Bay Oaks golf course. I can imagine some guy who owns a NASA contracting firm, who’s a bit too enamored with “The Most Dangerous Game” proclaiming, “I am only missing one trophy…a human! BWAHAHA!”
I think R.O., is a good guess, but I’m going south of Memorial between Carnarvon and Friar Tuck.
I’d guess this owner is old-money. Likes going hunting on the weekends with the other oil executives close to downtown. Has adult children but keeps rooms available in case they visit. The wife never worked, but does like to keep in shape and is out socializing most of the day. She’s not happy with the particular decor her husband likes to display, but man, he makes a lot of dough.. I’d like to see shots of the contents in the garage.
I’m guessing River Oaks, ’80s build.
Camp Logan
I think this is the home of a former AIG executive who is between wives. Back in the day he used one of his obscene bonuses to write a blank check to his interior decorator with the caveat that each and every one of his preserved animal parts must be incorporated into the design. Royal Oaks. On the golf course.
At first glace you say wow this is a giant house full of expensive stuff so it must be memorial, tanglewood, the bad end of river oaks, etc. But loking closer it’s not as nice as it seems. Although the collection of trophies seem to be from far and away lands, it’s much more likey that they are Texas-Raised exotics not true Africa Safari level trophies (deer and bison are a lot different than Elephants and true buffalo). The zebra skin was definitely purchased, not shot by the owner. The furniture is kind of nice but has a Bass Pro/Cabela’s look as if that was a extravagent as the owner’s tastes got. The Media room is nice, but had to stay within budget. The bathroom looks cheap or at least 15 years old. Ditto for the Kitchen.
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The one thng that would help me determine where this house is is the provenance of the basket collection. There are a lot of them. Is this a 100k anthropologically significant basket collection from around the world or a bunch of junk collected at US Flea Markets and those identical Open Air tourist markets in every city in the world? The rest of the house lead me to say it’s the latter.
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So it’s a place that wants to be REALLY nice owned by a person who want to be in the BIG time but isn’t there yet and likely never will be. I’ll say a guy in some sort of oil-field service business who has made it big but has plateaued or worse started to see his demise. A persone like that would live in……Crosby (??)
I caint spell today. Sorry Gus.
I don’t know, this seems like big time to me, the decor is too much to fake. This dude is the real deal, a true hunter/sportsman, a Ted Nugent or Brock Lesnar type of guy.
I’m thinking this property is priced in the millions, 6 or 7 thousand square feet, huge lot, like 2 or 3 acres. I’ll put this country estate off 249, past Tomball, say Pinehurst.
It’s like Africa Haute! Tarzan couldn’t stand this house!
The windows make it feel like it has a vista. Lake? Golf Course? Maybe just a really impressive pool. Trees make me think its northward, but not too far north because it looks like they have some pricey tropicals in back. I’ll stick with golf course in the Champions area.
There don’t appear to be any “next door neighbors” which in most areas there would be. Especially in neighborhoods mentioned so far. It appears to be a large lot. But it still has that Tanglewood look and feel about it. So if it’s Tanglewood it would have to be north of Woodway. If not Tanglewood, somewhere in Piney Point or Hunters Creek. Possibly one of the “nouveau” streets like Arrowwood or Windemere where a lot of “new construction” spec homes went up in the 1990s and this house is definitely 1990s. The exterior has that “nouveau” look that really doesn’t look like Tanglewood.
If not Piney Point or Hunters Creek then the Bayou Woods/Sherwood Forest area along Memorial just west of 610.
It could be 1960 but I’m not familiar enough to take a guess about 1960. If it is then it would have to be in a subdivision like Northgate Forest.
It is a spec house by the way. The cabinetry in the kitchen and bathrooms are the same. Screams spec house.
One curiosity is there appears to be two bedrooms downstairs. A master and a second bedroom. So there may be a second master on the second floor. That’s unusual and not common except for “outside the beltway” so who knows. Maybe it is 1960.
I should go house-hunting in MLS but that’s really not much fun.
It just has the Tanglewood look. Oh, well. We shall found out soon enough.
How about west friendswood, where you can unload a clip at night from the porch of your 6,000+ sq/ft house on 4 acres, a place where packs of wild dogs live short lives.
Memorial. I have to say, I do love the turquoise walls.
^Sue, I’m with you & LOVE the colors! I’m so disappointed by the bland home-gym & boring attic media room. I agree with Jane that there’s a decorator involved here – on retainer.
^ Mystery Matt: I too look at cabinetry, finishes & trim. This is basic, 80/90s, built-on-site work. As for the fridges: I guess there’s a big ole 5-car garage attached to this home, and, therein: cooling for the Miller Lite and the MEAT.
^Tex, I’m intrigued by your Mt. Belvieu guess! I don’t know that area, but I can’t forget the FLAKIEST client ever with the HIGHEST expectations: Building there.
^Biggie Shortie, Are you envious?
While it’s too late for PETA, I’d say we all head to Magnolia, where there’s been an explosion of home/shrines built in the last 10 years.
I’m guessing the Memorial/Beltway 8 area. Definitely a bachelor pad, and the decor is a big old f*** you to his Ex. He’s on a rodeo committee.
The real question is how many gallons of Kilz will it take to cover those walls. The colors are going to put so many people off he’ll have to lower the price at least once. Maybe he’ll repaint and lose a couple of those “trophies”.
Somewhere in Brazoria County, Lake Jackson, West Columbia area.
Truly a mystery. Could be anywhere. It is possible it’s in the Northwest area. The 290/Highway6/1960 area perhaps. The few trees you can see appear to be mature. At least one pine tree. So that indicates certain areas. Either west or northwest.
There are those shrubs outside the window of that second bedroom. Something about them. Large lot but a “subdivision” lot. If I didn’t know better I would say Bellaire. I don’t know better so what the hell. Has to do with those shrubs. And the entry. Could be Tanglewood. Could be Bellaire. Oy vey. Maybe one of those Pearland homes. I don’t do Pearland so I wouldn’t know.
Haven’t a clue, but kudos to the person who nominated this wacky place! Oh, must guess anyway and someone already took the obvious Hunter’s Creek haha. Along Buffalo Bayou near the Houston Country Club.
This is so Woodlands. Are those shrunken heads in the kitchen cabinet?
Holly creek neighborhood, west of Tomball
Those upstairs balconies do scream “bayou” don’t they?
So, Gus, where is it?
This has to be Sugar Land, in that neighborhood I’m trying to forget with all the wannabe-River Oaks McMansions.
Sugar Land. It could be Sweetwater or possibly Sugar Lakes/Venetian Estates. Or maybe The Peninsulas in Oyster Creek. Then there’s Pecan Grove in Richmond. So many subdivisions. So many areas. It just has that Tanglewood look. And it’s 9 pm on Thursday and it’s still a mystery.