Karl Kamrath Home At 8 Tiel Way

[hindesky]

https://www.chron.com/homes/article/karl-kamrath-frank-lloyd-wright-houston-house-17354766.php

[Ross]

I've been in that house. It was something like 25 years ago. My wife knew the wife that is the co-owner. Awesome house. Difficult to maintain, they said, because it's not standard construction.

[mkultra25]

I'm pretty sure this house was one of the houses featured on a tour of mid-century modern houses around 10-15 years ago. It is indeed an awesome house.

[Ross]

From the County Clerk's records, the current owners bought the house from Karl Kamrath's first wife, Eugenie Sampson Kamrath a couple of years after the Kamraths divorced. The price appears to have been somewhere over $400,000, which was real money in those days, a time when a friend of mine bought a house in Hunters Creek Village on a 1.5 acre lot for $90k.

Eugenie Sampson Kamrath Gonzalez died in 2018 at the age of 105.

Here's a document from the Planning Department for a house on Inwood that has a biography of Kamrath, McKie, and their firm https://www.houstontx.gov/planning/HistoricPres/landmarks/10L232_Fennekohl_House_3827_Inwood_Dr.pdf

Here's a link to the list of Houston landmark buildings http://www.houstontx.gov/planning/HistoricPres/landmarks.html

[s3mh]

How do you live in a MCM masterpiece without a single stick of actual MCM furniture?  

[Earlydays]

I think the the "classic" furniture works well.....as mid-century furniture would also.

[Ross]

4 hours ago, s3mh said:

How do you live in a MCM masterpiece without a single stick of actual MCM furniture?  

Maybe the owners like MCM architecture, but not the MCM furniture, some of which is really uncomfortable. But, why would you care? People live in houses, not museums, and usually live with the stuff they think is comfortable and fits their taste. 

[s3mh]

1 hour ago, Ross said:

Maybe the owners like MCM architecture, but not the MCM furniture, some of which is really uncomfortable. But, why would you care? People live in houses, not museums, and usually live with the stuff they think is comfortable and fits their taste. 

Not seeing a high priority on comfort in the current furniture choices.  

Sure, people are free to decorate their house however they see fit.  But I am also free to point out how totally lame it is to live in one of the grandest MCM houses in the city and not even bother to decorate it appropriately.  MCM architecture and MCM interior design were meant to be complimentary to each other and pull it off better than any other period of design and architecture.  It is just sad that whoever had enough money to buy that place certainly had enough money to fill it with beautiful MCM pieces but simply chose to keep their frumpy English and French antiques.  Lame.

[Ross]

6 hours ago, s3mh said:

Not seeing a high priority on comfort in the current furniture choices.  

Sure, people are free to decorate their house however they see fit.  But I am also free to point out how totally lame it is to live in one of the grandest MCM houses in the city and not even bother to decorate it appropriately.  MCM architecture and MCM interior design were meant to be complimentary to each other and pull it off better than any other period of design and architecture.  It is just sad that whoever had enough money to buy that place certainly had enough money to fill it with beautiful MCM pieces but simply chose to keep their frumpy English and French antiques.  Lame.

The owners have owned that house since 1978, and are in their 80's now. If I remember correctly, the previous owner took all the MCM furniture when the current owners bought the house. In any case, your criticism is pretty asinine and inappropriate.