good will hunting

Houston designers shop this River Oaks store for eclectic accessories

Tucked away in an adorable collective of jewel box boutique spaces for local independent businesses sits Hunt & Bloom. This blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shop is a fantastical emporium of all things kitsch. In just under three years, proprietor Will Hunt Lewis, with his encyclopedic knowledge of all things interiors, has made himself indispensable to Houston’s top designers — the designer’s designer, if you will.

A long and storied career in buying and merchandising for top brands like Jonathan Adler, One Kings Lane, and Kravet, as well as a successful store and events business in his home state of Mississippi, primed Lewis for his current position as the authority in well-curated taste. Lewis is often called upon to contribute to blue chip design media outlets such as Martha Stewart Living, House Beautiful, Architectural Digest, Veranda, Southern Living, Forbes, and more, and Houstonians should revel in the thought that we get to keep him right in our backyard.

A single visit to Hunt & Bloom will make any and every maximalist feel right at home. The shop is a delightfully-tiny wonder, but hours pass like minutes while discovering everything from majolica oyster plates to weathered vintage garden gnomes. One thing’s for sure: this shop is no sparse, gallery-chic showroom, and Lewis wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I’m more, is more, is more, is more,” Lewis says of his quirky, off-the-beaten-path boutique. “I love color! I am the opposite of that kind of ‘California Cool’ aesthetic, even though it’s gorgeous. I love a beautiful, natural linen sofa, and I love neutrals and that sort of thing. I tried to be a minimalist, and sleek and cool in one of my NYC apartments. That lasted for about five minutes — and that’s just how it is.”

A designer’s designer

Antique and vintage finds nestle among capsule collections from makers both stateside and across the pond. Stately coffee table books, candles, trays, matchbooks, and a plethora of beautifully-made ceramics and barware fill every nook and cranny, floor-to-ceiling shelving, and antique buffets and tabletops in this classically-moody space.

“I love to mix in new with old,” Lewis tells CultureMap. “That’s what I wanted this store to be about, mastering the mix of incorporating old pieces with new pieces.”

This masterful mix of old and new is what keeps top Houston designers clamoring for Lewis’ wares. Taking place quarterly, his wildly popular Tastemakers on the Hunt series invites in-demand designers like Creative Tonic’s Courtnay Tartt Elias, Kara Childress, and former Luxe Interiors editor Paulette Pearson to curate capsule collections from the store’s inventory that fans may then shop online. Lewis’ next tastemaker is none other than Nashville-based designer, author, and internet personality Stephanie Sabbe, who has over 80,000 Instagram followers.

Helping homeowners

Those familiar with the successful Hunt & Bloom website can attest that the store carries decor, gifts, and trinkets for any budget — the same can be said for the store.

“As a merchant or courier, I want to have things that anyone can come here and buy,” says Lewis. “So whether you’re looking for aspirational, or entry-level, I’ve got a price point where you’re not going to come in and say: ‘This is not for me.’ I never want someone to feel like that. There is really a reason that I have the things that I have; I want someone to come in and pick up anything.”

All too often, homeowners struggle with the task of filling shelves, bookcases, China cabinets, and even coffee tables in a way that appears studied, thoughtful, and well-traveled. Hunt & Bloom offers shoppers the opportunity to have Lewis curate these spaces in a way that appears both lived-in and personal, finding the perfect pieces to complement cherished family heirlooms and collectibles that may have lost their pride of place.

An advocate for what he has coined “the art of slow decorating,” Lewis laments that homeowners feel pressure to buy items for the sake of filling spaces as quickly as possible: “If you have built-ins, they don’t have to be full right away.” The all-too-common practice of making a Supermarket Sweep through the local Home Goods is not something that Lewis believes benefits anyone, much less a home’s interior design goals.

“What does that do besides fill space,” he says. The notion prompts Lewis to recall a quotation that was displayed in the corporate offices of Jonathan Adler in NYC: “Don’t buy it if your heirs won’t fight over it!” So, filling spaces with meaningless items is deemed a bad investment of both time and resources. “Who’s going to be fighting over all that stuff,” asks Lewis. “Nobody. So take your time and find pieces that you love, not pieces that you have to have right now because it has to be done — because you don’t actually have to.”

In addition to furniture and decor for every day, Lewis goes all out for the holidays. While Christmas is when holiday staples such as Spode and Radko are out in full force, he makes sure to stock party supplies, gifts, and decorations for shorter-lived celebrations like Valentine’s Day. Currently, the shop is full of fervor for Fall! Velvet pumpkins, pheasant feathers, and a dedicated “Spooky Shop” of vintage-inspired table decor are ready to adorn new terrains.

Hunt & Bloom welcomes the community to enjoy their recurring book signing events, artisan pop-up shops, and floral workshops. Also worth checking out is their new collaboration with Helenita Home. The store is also a top three finalist for a coveted ARTS Award for Best Home Accents Store for the Western US Region — impressive!

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Hunt & Bloom is located at 2600 Persa Street, Houston, TX, 77098.

Courtesy of Hunt & Bloom

Lewis has stocked every nook and cranny with gifts and home decor.

home-design shopping hunt & bloom

on the trail

Celebrate spring's arrival at these 2 Houston garden tours

Courtesy of Bayou Bend

The tour includes Bayou Bend's impressive gardens.

The Azalea Trail, one of Houston’s most enduring seasonal traditions, returns this weekend. Once an annual event, the now biennial tour is a do-not-miss affair offering the opportunity for Houstonians to experience some of the best gardens and architecture the city has to offer — all before the Bayou City gets too balmy. Additionally, the newly opened Ismaili Center will offer complimentary tours of their nine acres of gardens in conjunction with the Azalea Trail.

Now in its 88th year, the River Oaks Garden Club’s Azalea Trail has long served as something of Houston’s unofficial kickoff to spring — that moment when azaleas, camellias, dogwoods, and early bulbs begin peaking across the city and residents head outdoors again. The event blends horticulture, history, architecture, and philanthropy into a weekend experience that consistently draws both dedicated gardeners and design-minded visitors from around the city and the region.

“Throughout the 88-year history of the Azalea Trail, select homeowners have generously offered an intimate look at their beautifully-curated private home gardens. In 2026, Azalea Trail goers will be able to tour four private home gardens featuring unique, breathtaking designs,” Emily Bolin and Hilary Purcel, chairs of this year’s River Oaks Garden Club Azalea Trail, tell CultureMap.

“Each location, which also includes Bayou Bend, Rienzi and the River Oaks Garden Club’s Forum, will offer an abundance of inspiration, including enticing planting combinations, creative concepts, emerging trends, and stunning floral displays. We hope to see everyone this weekend as we kick off the spring season in Houston.”

This year’s Trail runs March 6-8 and includes access to seven gardens for $35, spanning four private residential landscapes in the Tanglewood and close-in Memorial areas plus the aforementioned established cultural sites including Bayou Bend, Rienzi and the River Oaks Garden Club’s own Forum of Civics garden.

The private gardens — always a highlight — offer rare behind-the-gates access to curated residential landscapes showcasing planting combinations, emerging design ideas and seasonal floral displays that often influence Houston gardening trends. Meanwhile, the institutional stops provide historical context:

Bayou Bend Collection and Gardens: a 1926 River Oaks estate, now stewarded by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and surrounded by formal gardens and natural woodland landscapes, including azaleas, camellias, redbuds, and seasonal bulb displays planted by Garden Club members. Also, it is their 60th anniversary this year (opened to the public on March 5, 1966).

Rienzi: a former River Oaks residence turned MFAH house museum, where formal European-inspired gardens meet native Texas plantings.

Forum of Civics: the Garden Club’s historic River Oaks area headquarters, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Importantly, Trail proceeds directly fund local beautification, conservation, and horticultural education efforts, including historic garden preservation and environmental programming across Houston.

Tour the Ismaili Center

Just minutes away, the newly opened Ismaili Center, Houston — already earning international architectural attention — will offer complimentary public tours on March 7 and 8 from 8 am to 4 pm. The Center’s landscape makes it a compelling add-on to an Azalea Trail itinerary.

Designed by Thomas Woltz of Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects — also responsible for recent projects at Rice University, Rothko Chapel, and Memorial Park — the more than nine acres of gardens reinterpret historic Islamic garden traditions through a contemporary Texas lens.

The design incorporates terraced lawns, shaded promenades, water features, and resilient plantings arranged as a symbolic ecological “transect of Texas,” moving from desert species to prairie and Gulf Coast plant communities. The landscape also doubles as environmental infrastructure, engineered to withstand major storm events while creating a calm, civic sanctuary overlooking Buffalo Bayou Park. Visitors that weekend can choose:

Full architectural/property tours
Focused garden introductions
Self-guided QR-enabled exploration

Together, the Azalea Trail and the Ismaili Center present a compelling narrative about Houston’s garden culture — where historic private landscapes and philanthropic garden traditions intersect with a globally-influenced new civic landscape designed for reflection, dialogue and public access.

The Azalea Trail will offer a free shuttle service between Rienzi and Bayou Bend. The locations of the four private homes on the tour will be sent via email with ticket purchase confirmations — street parking is available at all private home locations. The event will take place rain or shine, so keep an umbrella handy this weekend.

Courtesy of Bayou Bend

The tour includes Bayou Bend's impressive gardens.