On The Market

The ultimate bungalow? Lovingly restored Heights house turns heads — an $825,000 time machine

Editor's Note: Houston, the surrounding areas and beyond are loaded with must-have houses for sale in all shapes, sizes and price ranges. In this continuing series, CultureMap snoops through some of the best and gives you the lowdown on what's hot on the market.

A once small, three-bedroom, one-bath bungalow needing some TLC in the Brooke Smith neighborhood in the Greater Heights area now stands as an authentic, accurate and admirable tribute to the original American Arts and Crafts style.

While celebrating its own open house, the local larger-scale "ultimate bungalow" even turned heads and attracted visitors during the recent American Institute of Architects Houston 2014 Home Tour. The house, located at 512 Archer St., is now for sale at $825,000.

"It was the house that we first lived in together. We literally got married on the front porch of this house."

The 2,460-square-foot residence blends period details with modern features. Taken to the studs, careful craftsmanship is evident throughout, from reclaimed hardwoods and shiplap; antique doors, windows, lighting fixtures and shutters salvaged from historic structures; to custom cabinets and bookshelves. The four-bedroom charmer also offers 400 square feet of covered and screened porches, including an outdoor kitchenette, making nature very much a part of the living experience on the 5,000-square-foot lot.

So who is behind this local authentic American Arts and Crafts revival?

Meet Anthony Harnden, president of The Contemporary Craftsmen, a company of six determined to meticulously represent classic Craftsman style in its projects.

Harnden took time to respond to a Q&A email from CultureMap to share more about his latest creation — down to the nails.

CultureMap: Tell us about The Contemporary Craftsmen. What are your inspirations and goals?

Anthony Harnden: We started in 2008 right after the recession. I got my feet wet by moving a house from the Woodland Heights to a piece of property that we had purchased the previous year next to our residence. The Contemporary Craftsmen officially started about a year and a-half ago. I am the sole member of the LLC and have six full-time employees, mostly carpenters/painters.

I started my second period restoration about two years ago. This was a house that (my wife) Kay bought for herself before we met. It was the house that we first lived in together. We literally got married on the front porch of this house. The house was what I call a working-class Victorian — T-shaped with three rooms total plus a bathroom that was added at some point.

I really wanted to recreate the experience I had in some of the homes we visited in New Orleans. I wanted the screened-in porches, the court yards, the French doors, sun rooms and transoms. I wanted there to be a sense of having layers of history. I finished the house, and we had a pretty good amount of interest.

I guess the goal of The Contemporary Craftsmen is to make a connection. My inspirations come from personal experiences. One of the three couples that have showed serious interest in the house at 512 Archer, my second house in this style, spoke with me. She told me that she was from Pasadena, Calif. She lived one-half a mile from The Gamble House. She said that the house that we built reminded her of the house that she grew up in. She was even tutored in a Greene and Greene house.

It's difficult to describe what a gift she gave me by telling me these stories. Not many people have the chance to make that kind of connection with people. I think a lot of builders try to take buyers to the next level. We try to take people somewhere they have already been.

CM: What were the major steps you took in order to begin the process to create a true American Arts & Crafts house?

AH: One of the challenges with this design were the 3-foot eaves. Greene and Greene houses typically have closer to 5-foot eaves. With 3-foot eaves plus a 12-foot-wide driveway, the location of the house on the lot becomes an important factor. So we had to move the house over about five feet. Since we were adding up, we decided to take that opportunity to build a proper foundation for the house, so we had the house lifted about six feet so we could get under there and rebuild the foundation.

CM: Tell us about your favorite repurposed features incorporated into the house and where you found them?

AH: We bought a building, a two-story brick building, in the neighborhood that was built in 1929 located at 1000 Enid, our current project. This property was originally a grocery store and had rental units upstairs. We scored four clawfoot tubs and several sinks from this building. We used two of the clawfoot tubs and one of the sinks at 512 Archer. One of the other sinks came from Adkins Architectural Antiques. Many of the sconces came from August Antiques on Heights Boulevard. We also used reclaimed oak floors.

"I think a lot of builders try to take buyers to the next level. We try to take people somewhere they have already been."

One of the things that gets noticed the most are the industrial exposed track doors, but its the subtle things like the mortise sets and porcelain door handles that are my favorites because people don’t notice those things. They just experience them when they pull the door closed. It's not visual; it's sensory and subconscious.

CM: American Arts & Crafts houses typically have furniture built specifically for certain areas of the homes. Is any of the furniture especially made for the house?

AH: We built the dining table out of ash. We were kind of excited about it actually. We bought the wood from Clark’s Lumber. The ash had been left in the kiln for an extended time. causing the wood to turn a beautiful deep coffee color all the way through and giving it a wonderful smell, almost like a cigar. After it was finished, we decided to rub it down with mineral oil instead of putting a finish on it so you can smell that ash when you walk in the house.

CM: Tell us about the other house you built in this fashion?

AH: We have done two “California Craftsmen” on this street. The other one is located at 506 Archer. We were kind of proud of that house because it was actually a new construction. If we didn’t tell you, though, you wouldn't know it. We definitely used reclaimed material in that house, but it had an element that was greater than the sum of its parts. We felt like we breathed soul into it. It really felt like it had been there 100 years.

CM Anything else you would like to add? I heard a lot of people on the AIA Contemporary Home Tour saw the house and liked it!

AH: I wish I could take credit for planning this, but it was purely a coincidence that our open house was on the day of the AIA tour. Our friends and neighbors have a house that was on the tour. They live four doors down. They sent quite a few people down to see our house.

It turns out that a lot of the people on the AIA tour have an appreciation for Early American Arts and Crafts as well as contemporary. Happy accident, and generous neighbors.

Take a visual tour of 512 Archer St. by clicking through the slideshow above.

Square footage: 2,460

Asking price: $825,000

Listing agent:Kay Harnden, Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices

The light-filled parlor with staircase to the right.

On the Market 512 Archer St parlor November 2014

Photo by © William Tadlock

The light-filled parlor with staircase to the right.

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good as gold

Boutique Australian furniture brand opens first U.S. studio in Houston

Courtesy of En Gold

The Houston store has the full En Gold line as well as products from other Australian brands.

Say hello to En Gold! Diehard fans of the coveted Australian furniture brand finally have a stateside gallery, right in Houston’s Upper Kirby District (3330 Audley St.). Cool and crisp, the vintage-inspired, handcrafted collections shine a spotlight on the long-forgotten craft of Fossil Stone artistry.

Courtesy of En Gold

The Houston store has the full En Gold line as well as products from other Australian brands.

CultureMap caught up with En Gold founder Steffanie Ball in her new gallery space to talk vintage, Fossil Stone, and how En Gold has revitalized an all-but-extinct pocket industry in Cebu, The Philippines.

What began as a maternity-leave-induced search for quality vintage led to instantly-sold-out Instagram pop-up sales and a lively cult following that demanded more. The vintage Fossil Stone phenomenon drove En Gold founder Steffanie Ball to seek out the original artisans that produced these iconic pieces in the first place. Now, 45 years after making its debut, Fossil Stone furniture is being produced once again — by the same artisans who produced it the first time around. Only this time, the artisans are finally getting their flowers.

En Gold is the only brand in the world producing Fossil Stone furniture, and with their exclusive partnership with the artisans, it’s looking to stay that way. A form of limestone, Fossil Stone is native to the Philippines and contains organic inclusions that give it the appearance and character it’s known for. Quarried by hand, it’s then cut by hand into thin layers before being painstakingly sanded repeatedly until it is applied to a timber frame.

En Gold is all about sustainability, so any potential waste that comes from breakage is turned into a powder, then a putty, before finding new life as a decorative vessel, like the Laguna Vase or becoming a Paradis Mirror frame. “This craft is actually so beautiful because it has minimal wastage,” says Ball.

In 2018, the interior designer, turned industrialist, found herself in somewhat of a “nesting” quandary. “In Australia at the time, [furniture] was either mass-produced flat-pack, or crazy expensive and unattainable — there was nothing in the middle,” says Ball. “I couldn’t find anything interesting that had any kind of character to it, so that’s why I started to look at vintage.”

After more and more of the same pieces continued popping up on the secondhand market, questions about these beautiful stone works arose: “I couldn’t understand it,” she says. “Was it solid stone, was it faux marble? It was really hard for me to get any information about it.” All Ball knew was that she loved it, and kept buying all that came available. “I couldn’t pass them up! It needed a home. It needed to go where it’s appreciated,” she says.

Before long, Ball’s home started to resemble a warehouse. At the behest of a friend, the decision to part ways with some of these pieces had been made. She created an Instagram account to showcase vintage Fossil Stone pieces, and then two collections were dropped per week.

“The whole collection would sell out in three seconds — it was madness,” says Ball. “It grew into this engaged community with two-way communication. Customers would ask if we had more of certain things coming up. I could hear the things that they were looking for and really understand what I needed to be searching for.”

After countless hours of research, and discovering some dodgy European import practices of the 70s and 80s, Ball learned that every piece of Fossil Stone furniture had been made by skilled artisans in the Philippines, then stamped with either “Made in France” or “Made in Italy” once it had been unpacked abroad. Of the 80 Fossil Stone factories operating in Cebu during their heyday, only one remained.

“I found the last standing workshop that was creating furniture [back then]. He was not producing at all, but kind of still there — he said he didn’t know what he was still even holding on for,” says Ball. “Meanwhile, I’m searching all of Australia for this Fossil Stone furniture!”

For Ball, whose mother is Filipino, the discovery was kismet. Imagine the artisan’s surprise to learn that his creations were as popular today as they had been so many decades before. Ball struck an exclusive deal to get the factory operational once more and revitalize the industry, only this time with the craft as the main focus.

“Let’s tell the story about it. Where it comes from, whose hands make it. Let’s shine a light on the artisans who have been creating it this whole time,” she says.

They decided to reproduce three key pieces: the Tierra Petite, Isla Dining Table, and the best-selling Arena Coffee table. “We launched it online and the entire container sold out in one hour.”

Since that time, En Gold has expanded its offerings to include wooden, seagrass, and upholstery collections, but the ethos remains the same: “Always handmade, always traditional in its method. We try to use all natural materials,” says Ball. “All the timbers are native to The Philippines — native mahogany, seagrass, and another light timber called Gmelina.”

Ball is currently working on an iron collection as well. Fans of En Gold flock to the brand for its focus on craftsmanship, as well as the inherent individuality of each piece. Ball enjoys the love that En Gold clients have for the brand.

“When you’re working with handmade products and natural materials, there is an appreciation for the perfectly imperfect….you can see where they [artisans] were sanding,” she says. “When we talk about the fingerprints of our makers, that’s what we mean.”

The brand’s new Upper Kirby outpost will offer the entire En Gold line, as well as other female-owned Aussie favorites for shoppers to explore. Paintings and sculptures by Adele Naidoo, Karv Studio, White on Walls, and Denise Quah will be available for purchase, plus linen bedding by Cultiver. Australian-made skincare brand Gracious Minds will line the shelves along with top-tier Turkish linen bath sheets by En Gold’s luxe self-care sister-brand Yōli. Find dry-brushes next to Tiger’s Eye Gua Sha, essential oil dryer droppers, and hand-poured candles with En Gold’s signature blend of neroli, cedar leaf, and teak wood. A collection of Bordam candles will be on offer as well — everything one needs to tune into the Yōli playlist on Spotify and unwind at home.

En Gold has already opened their doors to fans looking to say hello, and invites fellow creatives, designers, and lovers of thoughtful design to celebrate the opening of their first U.S. gallery space on Friday, April 25 from 6-9 pm.

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