"I LOVE COLOR, but I hate a rainbow," says Natalie Steen. "I like it when three shades work together in an unexpected way, but don't give me all of them at once." The Houston resident's decisive eye is a hallmark of her weekly style newsletter, The Nat Note (thenatnote.com), a collage-like amalgamation of fashion and home finds currently piquing her interest. Fanciful hues and wild patterns are both givens. Feathers, fringes, and other festive trims make frequent appearances. This is the joyfully unconstrained land of "More is more." In 2021, she and her husband, Jamey, bought a 1951 brick ranch that had once belonged to his sister and brother-in-law.
When it came to decorating it, Steen took a similarly free-spirited approach, snapping screenshots of anything and everything that caught her attention-"a room, a hotel, a certain fabric she saw, a little vignette," recalls her friend and designer Lila Malone. "It was so fun working with Natalie. She had lots of furniture that we re-covered, some cool mirrors, and a variety of lamps. We called it the 'house of doodads.'
Every little knickknack has a tale to tell or is from somewhere interesting." The couple's art collection, developed with the help of Jamey's consultant sister, supplied another source of inspiration, from a pair of brightly rendered landscapes peppered with cacti to a handbeaded portrait of Steen's grandmother. "My husband is a seventhgeneration Texan. He has a very rich and well-documented family history, whereas in my case, my dad and grandparents came to the U.S. as Cuban exiles," says Steen.
"When they left Havana, they could only bring the bare minimum and had to start over. I find that a lot of what I'm doing as I'm thinking about our house and what to fill it with is trying to tell my family's story while honoring my husband's, because ultimately it's my kids' story."
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Forging a Legacy - A Fredericksburg, Texas, couple is creating a new class of heirloom cast-iron cookware
When Jay Mallinckrodt pitched the idea of crafting cast-iron cookware to his wife and business partner, Heather, in 2020, she was hesitant. I immediately said no, she recalls with a laugh. But I finally agreed as long as we made something that we would actually want to use ourselves. Like many others during the initial throes of the pandemic, their multigenerational family operation, Heartland Enterprises (which specializes in machining parts for jet engines and gas and oil equipment), was seeing a lull. “No one was flying; no one was drilling, says Jay. So we had time to try something different.
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Twenty-four years ago, Monika Maeckle bought a small property on the Llano River in Central Texas as an escape from fast-paced San Antonio. A journalist and marketing professional by trade, she didn't at first realize the value of the location on which she and her husband would later build their ranch. She also had no idea how this decision would eventually transform her life.One October evening a few years later, a friend invited Maeckle to their nearby house, which sat on a watershed with several large cypresses. All these butterflies dropped from the sky and started to gravitate toward the trees, she recalls. Stronger people who could swing a big 12-foot-long pole began trying to capture them, and we waited. By the end of the evening, we'd tagged a couple hundred butterflies, and I left there enchanted.
Oktober Feast!
While I respect your right to serve spooky food in October, you won't find any gory grub at my house this month. Instead, I'm hosting a gathering that's inspired by biergartens across the pond. The focus of the menu is a fondue made with Gruyère cheese and crisp Riesling-like beer-cheese dip but more elevated. It's served with a smorgasbord of dippers such as smoked sausage, grapes, apples, and a few amped-up store-bought snacks, like Mustard-Glazed Pretzel Bites and Smoked Paprika Potato Chips. (Just one taste, and you'll want to add this spice to every bag you open.) Pour yourself a Cider Shandy, and get ready for a good time. Prost, y'all!
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