“Tucked away on a quiet, hilly street in west Lake Highlands—the largely curbless section where wild peacocks roam—sits this life-size dollhouse.”
D Home wrote these words two years ago, describing the picture-perfect modern farmhouse at 7915 Forest Trail in our 2020 edition of “The 10 Most Charming Homes in Dallas.”
Back then we fell in love with the Flag Pole Hill house’s pastoral façade, accented by a White Dove by Benjamin Moore paint job and idyllic flower boxes. “I would agree with you guys,” listing agent Ty Vaughn says. “I think it’s one of the most charming houses in Dallas.”
Vaughn should know; he’s loved this house longer than we have. In August 2013, he helped interior designer Emily Hewett, who founded A Well Dressed Home, buy the home. Back then, “it was still a cute-bones house,” Vaughn says, but Hewett and her family completely transformed the property.
They added the pool, extended the home further back, and reconfigured the layout. The old office became an outdoor patio and the new office replaces the old formal dining room.
The rest was “cosmetic everything,” Vaughn says. Hewett installed shiplap across the entire house, from the four bedrooms to the enviable 478.33-square-foot game room above the garage. She added breathtaking new lighting—you’ll want chandeliers in every bedroom after seeing this house—and “her window treatments are second to none.”
The living room once had rustic, exposed beams across the entire ceiling, Vaughn says. However, Hewett cleared that all out, ship-lapped the walls, and refinished the oak floors. The new living area flows easily into the kitchen. There, Hewett kept the overall look and feel, but refinished the room, adding new Calacutta marble (she also used marble in all four of the house’s bathrooms) and a scalloped bar on the island. Because Hewett repurposed the old formal dining room, the dining table is now truly in the kitchen, set up between the counters and the island. “When you’re eating there, you’re in the mix,” Vaughn explains.
You have your choice of primary suites here; the house has two. After the Hewetts moved in, they extended the back of the home while also transforming the old, unusable single-car garage—the home had two garages at the time—into a first-floor primary suite. The new space keeps with the shiplap theme, is large enough for a king-size bed, and includes private access to the pool.
Perhaps the star of the primary suite, though, is the stunning clawfoot tub in the center of the bathroom. “You can see it all the way through, from the second you enter that room,” Vaughn says. There are also his-and-hers vanities on either side of the tub, plus a charming porthole window that looks out onto the pool.
The old primary bedroom, now the guestroom, is up on the second floor, right at the top of the stairs. It’s nice and airy, thanks to the vaulted ceiling and south- and west-facing windows.
There is great lighting in Hewett’s two kids’ rooms, too. Both are shiplapped—natch—and have lovely light fixtures. But “don’t go falling in love” with the antler chandelier in the boy’s room, Vaughn warns. The unique piece, made by Hewett’s father-in-law, is traveling with the family to their new home.
Outside, relax by the gas fireplace on the new covered patio. Or fall asleep to the sound of the pool’s deck jet water features on a sunny summer day in the cabana chairs. The Hewetts wanted an inviting, garden space, says Vaughn. So they got rid of the old deck, built a pool, and put in green turf all the way up to the doors. The Secret Garden mood changes at night, when the marquee canopy lighting, which feels “warm, cozy, romantic, and all the good stuff,” says Vaughn, turns on.
To see more of the home and how Hewett transfigured it, scroll through the gallery.
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