Years before “transitional style” houses, consisting of white boxes with pitched roofs, became popular, Dallas luxury home builder, Cy Barcus, asked Richard Davis to design a house for his personal residence. Located near Highland Park VIllage, the lot where Barcus planned to build was surrounded by homes built in traditional French Eclectic and Norman French style by the prolific Dallas architect of the twentieth century, Charles Dilbeck. Barcus wanted a contemporary home that would blend well with the nature of the neighborhood. In response and at Barcus’ suggestion, Richard designed a modern interpretation of a Cape Cod Saltbox style house.
The result is an unornamented, white stucco façade, topped with a prominent clay tile roof. The roof is accented with three dormer windows, roofed and flashed with Corten steel. Gabled parapet walls on each side of the house are also capped with Corten steel, as is the small awning over the entry.
Over time the steel has aged to a rust color that blends beautifully with the color of the clay tile on the roof. The warm brown colors of the tile and rust color of the steel create a contrast with the stark white of the stucco façade. Together the mix of materials and colors artfully blends a contemporary feel with the traditional saltbox form of the house.
One of the most unique aspects is the house is the rotation of the stair in the entry hallway that extends from the front door to the family room.
The hallway is narrower at the front of the house and widens continually as one approaches the opening to the family room. The stair, seen above in the plan of the house, is at a rotated angle within the octagonal composition of the plan. This creates a wider space in which to slip the powder bath and opens up the hall at the end for turning to go up stairs. Viewed from the family room at the rear of the house, the rotated stair and narrowed hallway create a forced perspective back toward the front door, which makes the hallway appear longer than it actually is and adds a dynamic to the space, caused by the juxtaposition of the rotated stair with the orthogonal walls.
The rotated stair has a solid gypboard guardrail with a cap of Douglas fir, and leads to three bedrooms and three bathrooms on the second floor.
The dining room is located at the front of the house, where light streams in through the large, steel-framed windows that dominate the front façade. The openings in the smooth plaster walls are trimmed with Douglas fir.
An outer hall runs the full length of the right side of the house, creating a gallery for the homeowner’s art collection. The interior wall is constructed of smooth-cut Lueders limestone. The exterior wall is a row of windows, letting in plentiful natural light and views of the lap pool in the sideyard.
The limestone fireplace is the focal point of the family room. The fireplace extends to the ceiling, which is vaulted and clad with Douglas fir. The light color palette and the varied textures add interest to the composition of the room and lend a contemporary feel.
The fireplace is a Rumford fireplace, which is tall and narrow to reflect heat. Such fireplaces were commonly used in the 1800s and can be found in important homes of the period, such as Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.
The open kitchen features finely crafted, oak cabinetry that complements the wood-framed doors throughout the house and the captivating vaulted ceiling in the family room. The center island is topped with steel, which heightens the modern feel of the house.
A narrow lap pool abuts the side of the house, taking full advantage of every inch of the lot. At a later date Mr. Barcus purchased the adjacent lot with his neighbor on the other side of the adjacent lot and split it down the middle with her to expand both lots.
The rear of the house includes a stone-paved courtyard that provides access to the garage, as well as to the gallery entrance and the family room.
Richard designed and Cy Barcus built this house before the house at the northwest corner of Beverly and Drexel, designed by Bobby McAlpine, was built for John and Ellen McStay. The McStay house is, according to Richard, the stripped down, unadorned assembly of white stucco boxes with steel windows that started the “transitional” style in Dallas. Davis claims that local architects looked at that house, which was derived from the Arts and Crafts style of the British architect, C.F.A. Voysey, and thought, “Aha, we can make contemporary architecture with traditional pitched roofs, white walls, and steel windows.” Davis and Barcus’ creation of this “transitional” style house came first.