Issue link: http://papercitymagazine.uberflip.com/i/699462
B Y R E B E C C A S H E R M A N . P R O D U C E D B Y M I C H E L L E AV I Ñ A . P H OTO G R A P H Y C A S E Y D U N N F O R S I S T E R B R OT H E R M G M T. A fter 15 years of cramped high-rise living, Wayne Braun was ready to expand. "Frankly, I got tired of being stuck in a building. I decided it was time to get back down to earth," says Braun, design director emeritus of PDR, a Houston design and interior architecture firm. "After so many years in a condo, the connection to the outside is what I missed the most — the ability to walk outside easily, back and forth." When the kids were out of college and a large lot in the Museum District came on the market in 2011, the timing was right to build a house from scratch, says Braun, who designed the architecture and interiors for his new house, completed in 2013. Brendan Custom Homes acted as general contractor. For inspiration, he looked to works by International style greats Le Corbusier, Gwathmey Siegel and Richard Meier, who are known for their elegantly simple, rectilinear buildings with open interior spaces enveloped by glass. "What resonates most with people about my house is how light and bright it is, even on rainy days," he says. On the first level, 24 by 9 feet of sliding glass doors in the living room and 16 by 9 feet of windows in the dining room surround a private courtyard with lap pool. "When you open the glass doors in the living room, it completely changes that room into a giant cabana," he says. "It's like you're really outside. That one aspect is truly transformative." "I 'm a frustrated architect, so I always wanted to design my own home," says Braun, who began college majoring in architecture in the mid-1970s at the University of Kentucky but later changed to interior design. His passion for construction and form found another outlet: designing office furniture for a half-dozen manufacturers including Steelcase and HBF (Hickory Business Furniture) in his spare time. "I always saw furniture as miniature architecture since it's three- dimensional," he says. "I also have a fascination with woodworking because of its manipulability and natural surface patterns. There's a foreverness about beautifully crafted wood furniture." Some of his own furniture designs fill his new home, including a sleek LIVING OUT INSIDE THE BOUNDARIES BETWEEN INSIDE AND OUT BLUR IN WAYNE BRAUN'S ART-FILLED MUSEUM DISTRICT HOUSE.