French Dressing

Can you really turn a big Texas home into a charming Francophile retreat? Oui, oui.

- Kathryn O'Shea-Evans

THEY SAY PARIS IS ALWAYS A good idea. So when designer Marie Flanigan decided to infuse this Houston home with details inspired by the city, the homeowners didn’t argue. “They live in Paris for part of the year, so much of the design aesthetic was influenced by their European roots,” she says of the young international family.

The newly built, 9,000-square-foot property in River Oaks—with architecture by Houston’s Benjamin Johnston Design—is, like the City of Love, utterly timeless and as indulgent as a tarte aux pommes from Poilâne.