Furniture and lighting double as art in the creve coeur home of Susan Bower and Stephen Leet.
The small but striking Midcentury Modern home of architect Susan Bower, principal of Bower Leet Design, and her husband, architect and Washington University professor Stephen Leet, was built in 1955. It was designed by architect Nolan Stinson as his own family residence. Bower and Leet purchased the house in 1996 from Stinson himself, updating such key areas as the bathrooms and kitchen while preserving the home’s unique original details, including rich wood paneling and ceiling beams.
Stinson, who worked for prominent St. Louis architect Frederick Dunn, was inspired by the easy living enabled by Frank Lloyd Wright’s Usonian homes. This house, which sits at an angle on a wooded lot, includes walls of plate glass windows designed to bring the outdoors in. “When we saw it,” Bower says, “we knew it was the one.”
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Cut from the Same Cloth
“Turkey Tracks” is a 19th-century quiltmaking pattern that has the appearance of little wandering feet. Patterns like the tracks, and their traditions and myths, have been passed down through the generations, from their frontier beginnings to today, where a generation of makers has embraced the material as a means of creating something new. Olivia Jondle is one such designer. Here, she’s taken an early turkey track-pattern quilt, cut it into various shapes, and stitched the pieces together, adding calico and other fabric remnants as needed. The result is a trench coat she calls the Pale Calico Coat. Her designs are for sale at The Rusty Bolt, Jondle’s small-batch fashion company based in St. Louis. —SAMANTHA STEVENSON
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A background in sculpture trained artist Aly Ytterberg to see objects more fully.
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How a little log cabin went from being a home to a guest house
IN GOOD TIME
With the help of interior designer Robert Idol, a Kirkwood couple creates a home that pays homage to the past, yet feels just right for their modern young family.
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"Food Raconteur” Ashok Nageshwaran wants to tell you a story.
The Right Move
New shops and showrooms bring exciting opportunities for local designers, makers, and arts organizations to sell their wares to home enthusiasts here and everywhere.
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Painter and gardener Lauren Knight branches out.
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Chris Mower of White Stable Farms discovered the Japanese style of gardening in Italy. Now, he’s bringing it to St. Louis.
Graphic Mood
Letters, icons, and illustrations that speak in a hand-drawn language
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Audra Noyes, of the Saint Louis Fashion Fund Incubator’s first class, opens an atelier in Ladue.
