Annette Schatte was able to envision the Houston house she and her husband wanted to build. Years earlier, she had stayed at a boutique hotel in Avignon, a place so evocative for her that she wanted to recreate the mood and feel of it. She commissioned the prolific-and, as she would learn, patient-Houston architect Reagan Miller to design the dwelling for the site that she and her husband had purchased in the city’s Museum District.

“I had in mind what I wanted, but I had trouble explaining it to Reagan,” Schatte recalls. “He kept drawing versions of a house. However, every time I expressed to him that it still wasn’t what I was seeing in my head, he would very patiently tear up the sketch and start again. How frustrating it must have been for him! But I discovered in the process that Reagan was someone you could really talk to and who would listen. He knew how to make a house into your home.”

To further emphasize Miller’s ability to empathize with his clients, Schatte relates her initial reluctance to express certain design changes she wanted. With the help of her interior designer and friends, she learned “to speak my mind. Reagan didn’t want to push any ideas on me or my husband. He just wanted to collaborate.”

This story appeared in the Summer 2020 issue of MILIEU. To read the complete story or to see all photos, visit the MILIEU Newsstand to purchase this issue in print or visit Zinio.com to purchase this issue in digital format.  

WRITTEN BY DAVID MASELLO