Rita Cammarata and Dottie Maggio were perfectly comfortable in their 1930s-era house near the Texas Medical Center, having expanded its smallish kitchen and making the place their own.
Things change, of course, and they did for Cammarata and Maggio.
Cammarata’s 85-year-old mother, who lived in Port Arthur, was getting older, and they knew that someday soon she’d need to come live with them.
The first time she broached the subject, her mother rejected the idea. She called again week later, getting an “I’m not sure” response. A week after that, her mother asked if she might be able to bring some of her own furniture. On the fourth and final call, her mother had come around: “When are you coming to get me?”
Cammarata, 60, and Maggio, 65, sprang into action to find a new home, either a ranch with enough square footage that they wouldn’t be stepping over each other, or a two-story with an elevator. Cammarata, a pediatric dentist, owns Cammarata Pediatric Dentistry Group; Maggio runs the business’s three locations.
They went to an open house at a spec home in Southgate, just blocks from where they lived, and when they walked in, they knew it was the home for them. It’s nearly 6,000 square feet — more than they thought they needed — but they could instantly see themselves in the home.
“I don’t think we knew we were ready for a style change. Everything was lighter, and the rooms were so much larger. When we walked in and felt the height of the ceiling and the openness, it just called for things that were more modern,” Maggio said of the shift from traditional to transitional decor. “It’s surprising how different I feel in this house. We are able to spread out and relax a lot more.”
While the home didn’t have an elevator, it was built to accommodate one. It was installed in just a few days with a minimum of fuss, and it works well for Cammarata’s mother as well as the couple’s dog, Maddie, an older shepherd mix.
They made the transition with help from interior designer Lauren Haskett of Lauren Haskett Fine Design, who they met when she worked at Kitchen & Bath Concepts.
They’d gone there looking for help with the kitchen expansion/remodeling job on their prior home and were so satisfied with Haskett’s work that they asked for decorating help, too. In the years since, Haskett has launched her own interior design firm.
Cammarata and Maggio — a couple for 37 years — bought the home in November 2018 and moved in immediately with Cammarata’s mother, who has her own suite upstairs with a bedroom, bathroom and den.
Cammarata is a graduate of the UT Health Science School of Dentistry and an active alumnus. When the school hired a new chair of the pediatric dentistry department, she planned a reception/fund raiser at her home.
So just a few months after moving in, the couple called Haskett for help. The party wouldn’t be for several months, but they were living in a big white box that needed everything.
Haskett brought in an eclectic mix of antiques and new furniture, lighting, rugs and art.
In the foyer, Haskett added paneling and Venetian plaster to its plain walls; she used the paneling to hide a coat closet in a corner. A beautiful rug, antique settee, small table and a chandelier make it a welcoming entry for anyone who visits.
Nearby, a simple office that looks out to a center courtyard got a major upgrade with black grasscloth wallpaper and black painted trim, setting a stylish mood in the office and offering a bold backdrop for a bright piece of contemporary art by Austin painter Sarah C. Ferguson.
When the coronavirus pandemic shut down Cammarata’s practice — they closed for seven weeks and weren’t fully operational for three or four months — she and Maggio kept the business alive working from this comfortable study.
A small transition space between the foyer and home office and the dining room is a jewel box of its own. Haskett wallpapered the walls and ceiling in neutral grasscloth, hung a large panel of framed chinoiserie and finished it with a pagoda-style lantern hung from the ceiling.
Dining rooms seem to be a thing of the past, but Cammarata and Maggio use theirs often. Everything in this room is new, including a large enfilade — a French term for an antique buffet — that sits behind a trestle-style table with a solid oak slab top and iron base.
“We learned early on to trust a professional. It’s what we ask of our patients, and things work a lot better when they understand what we know,” Cammarata said of the Rose Uniacke dining table. When (Lauren) says this table from England that costs this much money and cannot be sent back will be perfect for your dining room, you go ‘Really? OK. If you say it is, then we’ll go with it.’”
A satellite-style chandelier replaced a clunky, oversized piece that was original to the home, and Cammarata and Maggio purchased new art — a trio of panels by Sarah Genn and a landscape by Robert Roth to decorate the room.
The living room is filled with new things, including a light gray sofa and white chairs, side tables with an iron base and marble top, and one made of wicker in the shape of a voluptuous skirted table. A hat-shaped chandelier proved to be even more whimsical after it arrived, its ribbonlike “spokes” and rim able to be shaped any way they wanted.
When the women were moving in, they weren’t sure where they wanted their linen-covered, L-shaped sofa, so they told movers to put it in the breakfast nook, figuring they’d decide later where it would reside permanently. Instead, it stayed put.
They added motorized window shades, a small round table and ended up with the perfect breakfast nook, a relaxing place to have a cup of coffee or a light meal.
“When they showed the home to us, the Realtor said, ‘This is great for kids and watching TV.’ We don’t have kids, and the dog doesn’t watch TV,” Cammarata quipped.
The nearby kitchen was finished well, but the women brought barstools with them, and Haskett reupholstered them from mustard-colored fabric to a neutral palette.
The primary bedroom suite got some new things: a new bed upholstered in green fabric and a built-in desk made from the walnut top of their former breakfast table. A pair of comfortable chairs were reupholstered and wallpaper was added to the bathroom — a marbleized pattern in the water closet and vinyl grasscloth in the main area.
One remodeling fix was the exterior of the fireplace, which the builders had given an odd finish with uneven strips of sheetrock. Haskett and her clients weren’t sure what to make of it, except that it had to go. Instead, they installed a simpler finish: shiplap.
Cammarata said that while she and Maggio appreciate original art, they didn’t own much and weren’t plugged into the local arts community. They found Dimmitt Contemporary Art online and it became their go-to gallery.
“We gained a wine room and (the new home) gave us an opportunity to expand our art collection. We had more wall space. That was the fun part,” she said. “Now we see things and think, ‘Where would I put that?’”
One of the first pieces they found was the Ferguson piece in their study. Cammarata said she texted a photo of it to Haskett to see what she thought, only to find they were on the same wavelength. Haskett was about to send the same photo to Cammarata.
“I never thought I’d spend this much money on art. We turned down a piece that every day I think ‘Why didn’t we buy that?’” Cammarata said. “I don’t think of myself as a real artsy person, but you get the right piece and you look at it and it does change the way you look at a room.”
“It started as a white box, which is not us. The décor ended up very much a reflection of who we are and how we want to live,” Maggio said. “We didn’t have a vision of how to get there, but Lauren did.”
diane.cowen@chron.com
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