Eiley Grace Builders – Model House
Location Shoreacres, Texas Completed TBD General Contractor Eiley Grace Builders Structural Engineer PE2 Engineering Civil Engineer Hardey Group Interior Design Kristin McCabe Artistic Visualization Michael Chang
The builder, an owner of a plumbing company in the Houston area, is determined to start up a residential construction company. He approached the architect with the purpose of designing a modest but striking initial model home for this company. The site has a slight slope to an adjacent ravine, and local flood prevention ordinances require elevation of the house. In response, the concept proposes divisions of program spaces according to elevation heights. The entrance into a fountained hall progresses down a short flight of steps to a lower kitchen patio. Simultaneously, one floor above, the main living floor is flanked and divided from the more private sleeping quarters by a shift in floor elevation of 2 and a half feet.
Complementing this spatial concept is a careful selection of materials, facilitated by the client’s employment of a talented interior designer. A vigorous collaboration ensued, which produced a palette of natural materials in the vocabulary of clay, ventilation bricks, and cedar wood in the exterior, as well as charactered composites of simulated marble in the interior.