Saturday shelterporn

Regular shelterporners will know about our soft spot for contemporary architecture — more specifically, good contemporary architecture — so it's no wonder we're excited to feature the only Skidmore, Owings & Merrill-designed house in Houston, a 1982 home in Turner Addition. As Stephen Fox says in the Houston Architectural Guide, it's "self-effacing from the street and quite opulent inside." True enough.

Richard Keating, the partner in charge of SOM's local office from the mid-1970s through the mid-1980s (and the man behind Wells Fargo Bank Plaza, San Felipe Plaza and the renovation of the CenterPoint Energy Tower), designed the house with a pretty plain street façade, most of which is hidden behind a wall that provides a private front courtyard and wooden deck. Inside, the house centers on a large, open living room with sliding doors that open onto the front courtyard and a dramatic, two-story wall of windows overlooking the back yard and lap pool. The dining room, which opens onto the back yard, has a built-in sideboard with granite top, and the rather long and narrow kitchen and study have matching gray granite countertops. Upstairs, the master bedroom has casement windows, a wall paneled in light wood and a spacious balcony; the master bath — with more gray granite — is as simple and white as the other rooms.

What's great about this house is that it is designed to be a very private residence, but it's in the middle of the city, blocks from the museums and Montrose Boulevard. Plus, if you lived here you'd get to tell people your house was designed by the same folks who designed the Sears Tower. Not bad at all. Bedrooms: three. Bathrooms: two and a half. Square feet: 3,256. Price: $849,000. Open house: This home will be open from 2 to 4 p.m. Sunday — stop by 4949 Yoakum Blvd. and have a look.

And: If you're a John Staub fan, like we are, you'll want to check out the Robert A. Mosbacher house from 1959, available for $5.8 million — only slightly more than it would cost you to pick up a copy of Howard Barnstone's book on Staub.