The Modern House
And just what is this? It’s a beautiful home owned by Tim and Christine Michael and their family of three children. After selling a cottage style 1948 home in Millington where they had lived, and started their family, the couple wanted something different, 180 degrees different. They had always wanted to build a house, so when they found the perfect lot at the end of Charles Place, they jumped on it. “We loved the vibe that Munford has, we go to Church with a lot of people from Munford, and it’s the perfect commute from Memphis.” Tim told us.
Tim is an architect, owner of The Design Shop in Memphis, and he built something totally different for his family in Munford. “Christine wanted a great kitchen where she could cook and still see the rest of the family as we watched TV or did homework around the table, an open room.” Tim explained as Christine smiled and added, “I got the inside, he got to do the outside, I’m much more plain Jane, but I knew Tim wasn’t, this is his dream.” The design he created has won several awards, plus giving the couple a place to delve more into the mid-century modern lifestyle that they wanted. While there are still several things on their ‘to-do’ list, and wish list, the home is exactly what they love.
The lot has a natural tree edge on two sides of the lot, which gave them the advantage of the privacy offered because of the configuration of the house. “We both love natural light, and windows, and wanted to use that on this lot. Once you are inside, and you see how the light plays in the house, and moves through on the floor, it makes such a difference”, said Tim. “ We do have two shades for the windows in the house, one in the bathroom and one in the bedroom to keep the streetlight out at night. We realized in the winter months that you can see all the way through, so we needed to make sure we could have a shade in the bathroom.” Christine pointed out.
“We love art; we wanted to have meaningful pieces of artwork and have been collecting pieces that look right in the house,” explained Tim, “We want things that mean something to us, or speaks to us. We plan to add some landscaping around the house, but not a great deal, and Christine would like to have a pool in the back. The master bedroom doesn’t have doors, but it’s not a traditional door that needs to be put in, it will be from wall to wall and floor to ceiling.”
The exterior of the home is galvalume, or steel/aluminum alloy, which lasts an extremely long time [30 years] without rusting or painting, glass - commercial store-front window glass, and brick on the bottom.
“Our home was so different - some thought it was a bank, a drive-thru, some wondered if it was a ‘tiny house’, initially, people complained about it just a little, but I think they’ve figured out that we’re good neighbors.” Christine laughed, “We still get people asking ‘what is this thing?’ People are very intrigued, they may not like it, but when people come inside, and though our house doesn’t have fluff, they think it’s amazing because everything is pared down to it’s bare essence, they have a 180 degree change, they love it.” Tim added, “As an architect, i’m used to reading and designing according to covenants. The covenants in our neighborhood left enough flexibility to be creative and build a really traditional house or a really contemporary house, which lends to making a great neighborhood, without all of the homes looking exactly the same. They all coexist within the same remarkable neighborhood.”
They have four times the amount of insulation, the walls and ceiling are foamed, the roof is commercial grade and white, which reflects the sun. Christine added “Our small house in Millington had twice the utility bill for half the amount of space. Sometimes the air conditioner doesn’t even come on. All of the lights are LED, which helps out on the electric bill as well.”
“Tim and I are the most low-tech people you can imagine.” Christine explained, “Tim has an IPhone 4.” “We’re just not into techno-gadgets.” Tim added, “Inevitably, tech always fails, and for our own house, we wanted really low tech. It’s not a smart house at all. You see contemporary house, and think those are just loaded with technology. It just wasn’t as important to us. It’s just a very liveable house, very basic, but what it does have are some very wonderful characteristics that allow what’s important to shine through, the artwork, the minimalist material palette and the natural light that seems to find its way to every part of the house.”
The home has won a couple of awards, the most notable was the Memphis Chapter AIA [American Institute of Architects]. It won a design award, and has been submitted in State level this year - we should know in July if we won an award for that. It’s been published on a couple of websites that are followed by architects from all over the world, which is really nice. “It’s not our goal to have our house in every magazine, or on every website, but it is nice to have people think it’s cool enough to be there,” Christine smiled as she shared about her home.
“Different is good, as we say in our family. We don’t think we need to live in a large metro area just because we like modern architecture. We love the area, we like to think we can live the way we want to here in Munford, we plan on going to the ball games and doing everything everyone else does, just when we go home, it’s to a home that a little different than everyone else’s home.” Tim finished.