Soho House Austin
The Soho House Design Team completed an elevated sense of space for Soho House Austin with an iconic feel for members to enjoy all aspects of their stay in the Texas capital city.
On South Congress Avenue within a new building on Music Lane, Soho House Austin is a members’ club with spaces to eat, drink and relax, a rooftop pool and bar, 46 bedrooms, and a screening room.
Founded in 1995 by Nick Jones, Soho House is a home for creative people to come together, a platform that fosters creativity in all its forms, where people can share ideas and make connections. Today there are members and Houses around the world, and the first House in Texas has been designed as a comfortable home away from home for Austin’s thriving creative community.
Set across two floors, the interiors by Soho House Design combine Texas Modernism with a contemporary Spanish aesthetic, using a mix of vintage furniture with specially-designed pieces and working with local artists and craftspeople to contribute to the space.
RECEPTION & SCREENING ROOM
Members enter on the first floor to club reception, a light space with limewash plaster walls, a reclaimed timber floor and a big, vintage sofa. The furniture has curved outlines, inspired by Spanish design, and IKAT linen curtains with a Texas emblem on the reception desk.
The reception space leads through to the pre-screening bar and members’ screening room on the right. There are sofas and armchairs in the bar, to order a drink or snack before a film, and large windows that look out onto a courtyard in front. The screening room has velvet armchairs with individual footstalls and cashmere blankets.
CLUB, MAIN BAR & TERRACE
On the third floor, an overpass leads through to the terrace, which wraps all the way around the building and houses an outdoor lounge dining area. A wooden pergola sits overhead, with a big tree in the centre, wrapped by banquette seating and low-level chairs and tables all around. There are aged reclaimed wooden floor lamps and glass pendant lights dotted throughout.
The chequered limestone floor runs through to inside, the main club space. There is a central bar with a carved wooden front, plaster walls, large linen lanterns overhead and natural materials including stone tables, aged leather seats and a dark reclaimed timber ceiling. Large ceramic lamps throughout the space have been created by Keith Kreeger, a local Austin ceramicist. Vintage chairs are mixed with new timberwork joinery on the wine cabinets, designed with a clean Texas modern feel and metal Texas emblem embellishments.
The art collection at Soho House Austin is entirely comprised of works by artists with roots in Texas, with a strong emphasis on those currently working in the city. As in the other Houses, the collection is gender neutral and spans museum level artists such as Deborah Roberts through to young emerging talent.
ROOFTOP POOL
Through an outdoor pathway lined with cacti, the rooftop pool is surrounded by sun loungers upholstered in a Texas tribal pattern. There is a bold orange and off-white diamond chequered floor and large plants that surround the space. To the right of the pool, the mural by Desireé Vaniecia employs a figurative practice to challenge stereotypes and tell stories of African American women.
BEDROOMS
The 46 bedrooms sit across the second and third floors, with a modern Spanish-inspired design, featuring limewash walls, curved furniture, fluted minibars, mid-century lighting and vintage pieces, with natural sisal floors over tiled floors in a Texan design. Linen striped curtains match striped fabric headboards on the beds, some rooms have exposed metal structure wardrobes with rails to hang clothes that also hold a mirror and vanity unit, while others have wardrobes that appear to be carved out of the architecture of the room, reminiscent of old architectural techniques from Texan history, with a soft linen curtain at the opening.
The bigger rooms each have an outdoor terrace that has an outdoor lounge and dining area, daybeds or a combination of both. They have a Texan style terracotta floor, a bed that is integrated with a sofa at the foot, a copper bathtub in the room and mid-century inspired lighting.
Design: Soho House Design Team
Photography: Cristina Fisher, Chase Daniel
