 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
An architectural landmark
and cultural touchstone is restored
The twelve-month renovation and conservation of the Houston home of John and Dominique de Menil was completed in the Spring of 2004. Funded entirely by private support from friends of The Menil Collection, the project’s goal was to return the house to prime condition while respecting a history that encompasses a half-century of the de Menils’ cultural and intellectual leadership in Houston.
The de Menils moved to Houston in the early 1940s and after several years decided to build their own residence. Their love and advocacy of modernism, already apparent in the art they had begun to collect, underscored another of their passions: architecture. In 1948 the de Menils commissioned Philip Johnson, who was the leading American disciple of Mies van der Rohe, then the exemplar of European modernism. The commission was a momentous one, for it introduced Johnson to Texas, a relationship that would play an important part in his extraordinary career.
According to Texas’s foremost architectural historian, Stephen Fox, the low-slung International Style house is “the modernist equivalent of Bayou Bend,” the celebrated Houston home of Ima Hogg. It is the first International Style house built in Houston and one of the earliest in Texas. The 5,600-square-foot, five-bedroom house has a spare façade of salmon-colored brick broken only by the entryway and a series of three horizontal windows. Set on a three-acre site near River Oaks, the house has living areas that look onto an interior garden courtyard and through large windows to expansive grounds beyond.
The Menil House caused a stir in Houston, then a city accustomed only to traditional architectural styles. It deeply influenced Houston architects Howard Barnstone, Hugo Neuhaus, Anderson Todd, and others, who in turn influenced generations of architecture students at Rice University and the University of Houston.
The de Menils were equally adventuresome in their plans for the interior of the house. Wanting something other than the furnishings that Johnson might have proposed, they audaciously asked America’s premier couturier, Charles James, who had designed many of Mrs. de Menil’s clothes, to help with the interiors (“We wanted something more voluptuous”). James produced rooms that balance Johnson’s spareness with a quirky sensuality. He designed curvaceous furniture for the living room. Exposed brick and white plaster walls are balanced with a surprising array of wall colors, including deep gray, mustardlike brown, pink, and sky blue.
For the next fifty years, the Menil House was the epicenter of a modernist force that transformed Houston. Here the de Menils explored and championed the new—bringing to the house artists, sculptors, filmmakers, and writers with their new perspectives in science and theology—and demonstrated their abiding dedication to civil and human rights causes. The house was filled with the heady collection of art that would become The Menil Collection, and many of its characteristics (its garden courtyard, dark floors, openness to light, and simplicity) would find their way into the fiber of Renzo Piano’s museum building.
Mindful of the building’s historical significance to Houston and to the collection, the Board of Trustees of the Menil Foundation, following the death of Mrs. de Menil, resolved to undertake a careful conservation of the house, respecting its original patina and resonance while conducting much needed repairs. To carry out this work, Stern and Bucek Architects led a professional team that included conservationists, curators, and architectural historians. As architect William Stern observed, “One cannot overstate the importance of conserving the mid-century landmark, particularly in a city not noted for preservation and in a time when modernist structures are just beginning to be seen as being worthy of preservation.”
The Menil House will be used for art installations and other cultural and educational activities, continuing to nurture the spirit of inquiry, exploration, and love of art with which the de Menils imbued it during their lives.
