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Shannon and Angie Davis have faithfully watched the TV show Flipping Out since it first aired in 2007. Two years into the show’s run, they decided to build a new house. They had the floor plan; the framing was going up.
“We were getting to the point that we were feeling that this is going to be more than we can chew,” Mr. Davis says. “We were watching the show, and [Angie] said, “Wouldn’t it be nice to just have Jeff do this?”
Mr. Davis laughed and said it would be fantastic. Mrs. Davis wasn’t as jocular.
“The next day she said, ‘If I can get Jeff Lewis to do our house, will you pay for it?’” Mr. Davis recalls. “I said, ‘Sure, honey.’ I did one of those… I don’t do that anymore.”
So Mrs. Davis emailed and called. And emailed and called. She sent pictures of the family. Once Mr. Lewis’ office caught the drift that she was serious and the budget was substantial, a telephone interview with the reality-TV star was set up. “It turned into a three-hour conversation,” says Mr. Davis, the owner of 11 McDonald’s franchises in the area. “You have the economics of Missouri and California. When they asked what we were spending on the house and we told them, they were like, ‘What? You can’t do that in California.’ We explained what you can do with that kind of money in Cape Girardeau and they were like, ‘Oh.’ They came out, saw the house, and here we are.”
“I came in at the perfect time,” says Mr. Lewis. “It was framed, but I could move walls. Some things were wrong, and I could fix them.”
He started with the floor plan. “We added a bathroom upstairs, because they had five bedrooms sharing two bathrooms, so we added a third,” he recalls. Jenni Pulos, Mr. Lewis’ diminutive (and quite honestly, delightful) executive assistant, notes the importance of that third bath—it went straight to the Davises’ 15-year-old daughter, Graeme.
Then there was the first-floor master bedroom: “The closet was almost the size of the bedroom, and the bedroom was too small,” says Mr. Lewis. “There were some scale issues.”
Those tweaks? Just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. Additions along the way included a second “daily use” garage where the kids can leave their bikes, so Mr. Davis’ collection of cars (including the ’71 Porsche 911T) could go into the garage under the house—where the tykes are not invited. Not to mention an elevator; a hallway to the master bedroom suite; a stunning back hallway with cubbies for the family; and a full laundry with two large washers, two large dryers, and a door that leads to the air-conditioned dog kennel. That kennel ended up with a heated slate floor, slate walls, a showerhead with hot and cold water, comfy beds, and a door leading to runs outside. “Sometimes the dogs just want to get back into their kennel,” Mr. Lewis says.
Apart from those additions to the plan, the home’s finishes were also personally selected by Mr. Lewis—and bought in St. Louis at KDR Designer Showroom and Global Granite & Marble. With a background in flipping houses (he’s done 70), he usually is working against the clock and using whatever happens to be in stock. Not this time. “What is nice about building your own home and taking your time is if there was a tile we fell in love with, we had the time to wait,” Mr. Lewis says. “I don’t have that luxury normally.”
Like any designer, however, he had to temper tastes to negotiate a pleasing outcome. “Shannon’s taste is more modern, like mine,” Mr. Lewis says. “Angie’s is more traditional, so I had to deal with that. We were able to come to a compromise.” But the Hollywood star didn’t win every battle. He frowned on the bunk-bed configuration in Emery’s room, since it overwhelmed the space. “I had to pick my battles,” he says. Those two washer/dryer sets in a shade of dark red? “I didn’t pick that,” he says quietly.
Of all the rooms—and they are all pretty spectacular—the kitchen shines brightest. “You could say we built the house around the kitchen,” Mr. Lewis says. “We spent a lot of time working on it.” First, note the attention to detail: the beadboard backs of the glass cabinets, the 2½–inch marble countertops, and the tile work. The tile, all the same color but in different sizes to create patterns throughout the room, runs right up to the ceiling. Mr. Lewis says the open shelves next to the windows were picked to prevent the room from feeling boxed in. Then there are the room’s finishes—marble, glass, wood, and stainless steel.
As with most of the house, this space borders on monochromatic. “I really prefer no color,” Mr. Lewis says. “I add my color in pillows, place mats, even flowers and accessories. I like a very neutral backdrop. It’s timeless. Then I can change it with my mood.”
There are a few technological flourishes, too. Installed in one of the two islands is Kohler’s Crevasse sink, for slicing, dicing, and shooting the remains down a stainless-steel ramp into the disposal. Add to that a few items many consider de rigueur: the pot filler, the built-in coffee maker, warming drawers, the carbonating machine, multiple sinks, and an oversized flat-screen TV. Ms. Pulos sashays over to one side of the room and pulls open a cabinet that leads straight into the trash can. “It has been interesting for us to see that when you do build your own home, for example, you can build custom bells and whistles into your garbage chute,” she says. “Working with Jeff Lewis, this would be a dream for me, because he always wants the trash out.”
“You don’t have to spend a fortune on a kitchen to make it look great,” Mr. Lewis says. “I can spend $100,000 or $25,000.” House Beautiful was so taken with his kitchen designs that they asked him to design their 2010 Kitchen of the Year.
The Davises’ job was novel for Jeff Lewis and company on several fronts. “This was our first out-of-state job,” Ms. Pulos says. “And we are ready for more.”
But there was still that California-to-Missouri transition.
“Jeff and Jenni were very impressed with the work ethic of the people here,” says Mrs. Davis. “[The construction crews] come at 7 a.m. and stay until 4 p.m. They were like, ‘Whoa, we never see this.’”
The Davises explained early on that the sole focus of the house design was the four children. Mr. Lewis has no children—although on more than one occasion he has pondered the possibility of adopting. But he’d do it only with his faithful housekeeper, Zoila Chavez, close at hand.
“These people could afford staff, but they don’t have nannies or live-in housekeepers,” says Mr. Lewis in tones of amazement. “They are all about the children. It is a childcentric house. I had to go into the frame of mind of a 40-year-old with children. It was different for me.”
And although the house is complete, the job isn’t done. After the homeowners’ association turned down Mr. Davis’ request to build a playground, he bought the lot next door. Now Mr. Lewis is designing it. “We talked about doing a playground that was fenced,” Mr. Lewis says. “The gates would be locked, and then they would give the neighbors keys.”
If one were to hit rewind on the project, the Davises would have had Mr. Lewis and company in from the start.
“Twenty-twenty hindsight, I wish we had thought of this prior to even drawing up plans,” Mr. Davis says. “We would have done a few things differently. We were on the right path, but it was overwhelming. We needed parental supervision.”
