Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/1500319
The artist in studio: Christy wears a silk-embroidered chiffon top of her own design. A beautiful vignette in the bedroom: a Baccarat sconce, one of a pair Christy wrapped in cloth à la Christo. Table and chair from Chateau Domingue and Christy's parents, respectively. RH velvet draperies. One of Christy's canvases rests against the wall. In Christy's bath, a 17th-century Belgian lantern from Chateau Domingue hangs over the cattle- trough bathtub customized by Houston stonemason Steve Keith. French commode acquired in New Orleans. Hand-drawn walls by Christy speak to the surrounding forest. Belgian antique closet door from Round Top. sculptural metal rain spouts, and meticulous Old World stone masonry. Olive jars, an antique fountain, tightly shuttered windows against the already hot spring sun, and massive stone steps lead to an imposing Nepalese wooden door. The towering windows were purchased long before the home's blueprints were drawn up, salvaged two decades ago from architectural remnants of Gulf Publishing Co., a Spanish- Mediterranean style 1926 building sited along Allen Parkway, razed in 2001. Interiors are kept cool via the shuttered exterior and a 20-foot-high vestibule where a primitive French 18th-century credenza from Chateau Domingue serves as pedestal for one of Christy's artworks. In contrast to the dusky hall, the kitchen is awash with light, with an oak trestle table, an island crafted from honeyed wood, antique metal lamps, rustic stone fireplace, and European fireback imprinted with the date 1730. This center of culinary action segues into the heart of the home, the great room, with its nacreous Venetian plaster walls and minimalist furnishings which float like sculptures atop the white stone floors. Antique textiles emblematic of crafts traditions in Latin America — specifically, weavings acquired on a trip to Buenos Aires — add texture and more doses of the handmade to the interiors. One of Christy's soaring canvases, Untitled, 2023, the 96 x 65-inch abstract with its oceans of blue and dynamic elements of oil-stick drawing channels a scroll by a dynastic Asian landscape master. "What's important to me is that my work is understood," Christy says. "It's about nature, but multilayered with ideas and deep meaning … My landscapes are about the energy and vital forces running through it. The lines in this painting are a metaphor for energy." Covered stone arcades attached to the house lead to the McWhorters' respective spaces — Hal's office and Christy's studio. On the other side of the kitchen, a cosseted 36