Aaron Antis calls it his "St. Jude moment," and the memory reminds him of what all the work that goes into building and promoting a St. Jude Dream Home is all about.
It was the day he stepped into St. Jude Children's Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, world renowned as the leader in medical science's work to heal children and fight childhood cancer.
He said he thought it would be a "very heavy place emotionally. I'm a pretty sensitive guy, so I didn't want to cry or break down in there. I went in with that expectation."
His understanding changed in that moment.
'Hope-filled place'
"The best way I can explain it is a hospital built by Disney," said Antis, vice president of sales and marketing for Shaw Homes, builder of this year's Oklahoma City St. Jude Dream Home. "It's like the most hope-filled place I've ever been.
"I remember seeing some kids coming down a hallway. Instead of being in a wheelchair, they were being pulled in a red wagon, and they had great big smiles on their faces, and I thought wow, this is a really special place."
He also remembers the earnest faces of grown-ups.
"The doctors that we met there, their commitment not only to the children that are there but to the world, to bring a solution to the world and to give the information away for free, that is what makes it such a special place," Antis said.
"In a world wherethere's a lot of crazy stuff going on, there's a lot of division of people, to have that kind of unity, and sharing information for the better good of the whole world — there's just an incredible heart behind St. Jude. The mission behind it is selfless, and we're just really thankful to be a part of that in a small way."
The fundraiser
The Oklahoma City Dream Home will be raffled off in the annual fundraiser for the hospital. The 2,500-square-foot, three-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath home, valued at $495,000, is at 14242 Fox Lair Lane in Fox Lair Estates at the northwest corner of N Pennsylvania Avenue and Waterloo Road.
The winner of the Dream Home and other prizes will be announced Aug. 26 on FOX25. Tickets can be reserved for $100 each atdreamhome.orgor by calling 800-592-1596.
Those who buy a ticket by Aug. 5 also will be entered to win a 2021 Nissan Sentra SV courtesy of Bob Moore Auto Group. Everyone who tours the house will be entered to win a $5,000 Visa gift card.
The home will be open free to the public from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays through Aug. 22. Face masks are required.
St. Jude Dream Home
Let's start in an unlikely place — unlikely unless you've seen it: the master closet.
"It's about as big as my first apartment. Isn't it lovely?" said St. Jude spokesman Chassidy Satterfield, giving a tour. "What I like most about it is it's right off of the laundry room. You go from the garage to the mudroom, laundry room, master closet, then into the dreamy master bathroom. It's just gorgeous."
Keep going, into the master suite to see the creativity of Jonathan Kwee, interior designer and owner-operator of Fabricologie, in Edmond.
A full wall mural creates the feeling of a big window and suggests openness.
"The tile in the kitchen, those gave me inspiration, and I thought wow, this is perfect for the color I want to introduce to Oklahoma because we're about, usually, four or five years behind. So I like to introduce new stuff and show builders," Kwee said.
Fabricologie also did the draperies and repurposed a pair of mid-century modern lamps and nightstands— classic furnishings with "a little glam" added.
Family, entertainingand the zombie apocalypse
Antis described the rest of the house and the thinking behind it.
A den, or study, is right off the front entry. "The idea is that clients that come to do business with you at your home, they don't have to walk through the rest of your home if it's dirty," he said.
Next door is a half-bath and across the hall are two bedrooms and a bath. It's a split plan with the kids' bedrooms on the opposite end of the house from the master bedroom.
"As you continue through the house, the home just opens up the farther you walk into it," Antis said. "Then you get this huge, wide expanse when you walk into the vaulted living room, dining and kitchen area.
"It's just one wide open space with really tall ceilings, just a very impressive space. The idea is that's like the core of the home. That's where families come together a lot of times, the kitchen and living room/dining area. It's great for entertaining, as well."
In the kitchen, the pantry rivals the master closet for sheer size.
"We're finding that people just want that really big space in there for storage. I don't know if people are expecting thezombie apocalypse to be here soon, but there's storage for that if it is," Antis said.
'Snooze button design'
Finally, back to the master suite and its layout.
"It's designed with what we call a snooze button design," Antis said. "The idea behind that is if you have a couple that wakes up at different times in the morning, (one)person can stay sleeping in the master bedroom because you have the master bathroom, then the closet connected, and from the closet you can go out to the utility room that goes out to the garage, and get in your car.
"You never have to walk back through the bedroom after you wake up in the morning, so the other person can stay sleeping, with no lights and no sound coming back into that room. It's a cool design, with a monstrous closet."
Building duringshortage
The Dream Home was touched but not slowed by the supply and supply chain disruptions that linger from last year's shutdowns and that are exacerbated by sky high demand for homes.
A few days before the Dream Home opened to the public, a hole remained in the ceiling over the kitchen island where part of a light fixture should have been.
It was on order — another whole fixture since parts are nearly impossible to get, construction superintendent Will Taylor said. He is overseeing the construction of 20-plus houses by Shaw Homes in three neighborhoods.
Taylor said construction of the Dream Home missed no deadlines, although kitchen and bathroom hardware shipments were — and are — slow and spotty.
"We were very lucky. All our flooring was donated," he said, and it and the cabinetry arrived on time.
"The devil's in the details when you finish homes. That's the hardest part," he said. "So sometimes when you need to fix, repair or replace, and you need that extra part, those are the things that are a little harder to get."
Real Estate Editor Richard Mize edits The Oklahoman’s Real Estate section, and covers housing, construction, commercial real estate, and related topics for the newspaper and Oklahoman.com. Contact him at rmize@oklahoman.com. Please support his work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a subscription athttp://subscribe.oklahoman.com.
