10/25/16 6:00pm

12020 Tall Oaks St Bunker Hill, TX 77024

12020 Tall Oaks St Bunker Hill, TX 77024

12020 Tall Oaks St Bunker Hill, TX 77024The house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for insurance company exec William Thaxton is back on the market again as of Friday, now listed at just $2.795 million. Wright designed the triangle-and-diamond-themed home with no air-conditioning system in 1954, though Thaxton and the builder eventually snuck some ducts into the red concrete floor; the mid-century space later got a classically-inspired makeover and circled the market drain toward lot-value sale and presumed teardown. But an early 1990’s buyer saved the property from demolition and removed the pineapple-shaped finials — while adding a high-ceilinged, right-angled extension which enclosed the almost-a-parallelogram pool in more of a central courtyard. (That extension contains a living room, lofted entertainment space, bedrooms, and a kitchen, meaning the occupant doesn’t have to spend time in the angular Wright portion of the building if they don’t want to. )

The new listing (the latest in an on-again-off-again series of market stints that started in 2010 at $3.5 million) includes a few new angles on the property, which (as seen from above) sits alongside a channelized ditch draining directly south from Memorial City Mall to Buffalo Bayou. The lights around the front door and entryway are equilateral triangles:

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Mid-90s Modern in Bunker Hill
08/05/16 11:15am

Houston: A Story of Sprawl in 5 Coasters, by Data Design Co.

Have you seen this video (at top) from the city’s planning and development department? It’s silent, several years old, and not the flashiest portrait of Houston available on YouTube. But in a compelling series of images, it shows how mightily the city’s official boundaries have grown — simply by tracking Houston’s annexation history, decade by decade.

But now there’s a more active way to appreciate Houston’s historically bulging waistline — one that could even help increase your own in the process (depending on your choice of beverages). Each of the 5 laser-cut acrylic coasters in Data Design Co.‘s limited-edition set (shown in the photo above) is etched with an outline of this ever-expanding city at some point in its history. Designers Brian Barr and Matthew Wettergreen had the sets manufactured in Houston by Post-Studio, and are now offering them for sale for $60. Buy a set, and try one beverage on each over the course of an evening of thirst-quenching, and you’ll allow yourself to drink in a progressive view of this city’s expansive growth.

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Pushing Boundaries
01/18/16 10:00am

3013-Bridle-Path-Ln12

The next generation of entertainment setups features prominently in this 6,389-sq.-ft Sterling Ridge Estates fantasy house, which overlooks a community lake. The 5-bedroom home provides adventurous buyers opportunities to escape to the past, the distant future, and various imaginative spaces: The 1.2-million home includes a castle bedroom and a theater suite modeled after Star Trek’s U.S.S. Enterprise, among other boldly-decorated retreats.

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Final Frontiers
12/09/15 3:50pm

2115 Wroxton St., Southampton, Houston, 77005

As of yesterday, the home at 2115 Wroxton is on the market again — this time for $4.5 million, and with some zoomy new angles among the listing photos.  When last we left the home in February of this year, the Southampton property had been listed (for the second time) for just under $3.5 million, and was bracing for auction with a minimum bid of $2.9 million. But the property was pulled from the market at the end of May, with no recorded sale. (The mod was first listed for $3.75 million in September 2013, but was pulled the following July.)

The new listing allows prospective buyers to peer across 1 of the 3 courtyards to Wroxton St. out front (above), and to gaze down into the pool through the solar screen (below):

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Third Time’s The Charm