“Even though I always see something new that I love, and I want it, I do hold onto things for a really long time,” Janecek says.
He’s had the John Dickinson twig mirror in the master bedroom, for example, since the 1970s, back when the designer’s pieces were made of plaster instead of fiberglass. And in the sitting room, there’s a love seat he bought when he was an odd-job-working 14-year-old.
“I refinished it myself,” he says. “I didn’t have any money to have anybody do anything like that. And I’ve had it re-covered four or five times.”
And, as luck would have it, a few years ago, Janecek stumbled upon the love seat’s mate at a friend’s antiques store in Connecticut. So he bought it, had them both refinished and re-covered, and now he can’t tell which is the original.
“They’re identical,” he says. “I don’t know which one I bought when I was 14 and which one I bought from my friend.”
Janecek’s love of art is also evident in the home. From a collection of portraits in the sitting room and a Zapata painting that hangs over the tub in the master bath to charcoal drawings in the entry and an Austin artist’s plywood deer head in the living area, every room has at least one artistic focal point.
Though the house is lovely, and every design detail was chosen with precision, the place is meant to be lived in—and partied in. Janecek and his partner entertain frequently, so they made sure the house would be conducive to get-togethers. In addition to a laundry room that doubles as a caterer’s kitchen, Janecek also installed built-ins that he stocked with vintage glassware and dinnerware.
“I try to make the table different every time I set it,” he says. One night visitors might dine off plates from the 1870s; on another, it might be the 1970s.
The couple has thrown parties for as many as 120 guests, but for more intimate affairs, the formal dining room gets to shine—more specifically, the dining room table, which was painstakingly created using goose egg shells. “It took forever to get that thing made,” Janecek says, “and very high cholesterol.”
Their next shindig, whether it be big or small, is likely to be a going-away party. The Hughes Lane house is on the market, and they’ve already chosen its replacement. How many custom doors Janecek will design in the new place and how many rooms he’ll convert into a kitchen remains to be seen. But there’s one thing that’s certain about the next Rickville: it will be a nice place to visit, and you’d definitely want to live there.
