Bernbaum/Magadini Architects featured in Patron Magazine December 2021/January 2022

PATRON DEC 2021/JAN 2022 BACK TO THE STAGE/AT HOME WITH THE FEARINGS/ABRAHAM ALEXANDER

THE PERFORMING ARTS Make a Comeback At Home With Wanda Gierhart Fearing & Dean Fearing

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Plus, Abraham Alexander

Walker sits tucked beneath Wanda Gierhart Fearing while Gumbo strolls by Dean Fearing.

A Tasteful Retreat DEAN FEARING AND WANDA GIERHART FEARING BRING THEIR VARIED LIFESTYLES AND TALENTS TO THE TABLE.

BY PEGGY LEVINSON PHOTOGRAPHY BY MANNY RODRIGUEZ AND JOHN SMITH 58 PATRONMAGAZINE.COM

A photograph in the kitchen by Greg Booth features Dean’s grandmother’s spoon in his son Jaxson’s hand.

Cassina dining chairs and custom counter chairs with counter stone from Marble Boutique, Dallas.

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ny discussion of celebrated chef Dean Fearing’s home would need to include his kitchen. Likewise, an article about marketing executive Wanda Gierhart Fearing’s home would include a room-sized closet filled with designer and couture clothing for the many high-level events she hosted during her time as chief marketing officer of the Neiman Marcus Group. It took architect Bruce Bernbaum and designer Dan Nelson, along with contractor Joel Greenwald, to help meld the furniture, art, and lifestyle of these two powerhouses into one perfectly styled Bluffview home. Art consultant Kristy Stubbs helped with the selection and placement of the art, combined with the couple’s own acquisitions.

Dean Fearing, the award-winning chef whose time at the Mansion on Turtle Creek introduced the culinary world to tortilla soup and lobster tacos, actually grew up “in every river city in the Midwest,” as he likes to say. He sampled the foods of America’s heartland, but it was St. Louis barbecue ribs that turned on his tastebuds. It was then he knew he had to recreate that taste. As one of the founders of the Southwestern cuisine movement, along with Stephan Pyles and Robert del Grande, he has been bestowed with almost every culinary prize there is, including the prestigious James Beard Award.

Unlike Dean’s small-town roots, Wanda’s marketing career has allowed her to live and work in many of the great cities, including London, Chicago, San Francisco, and Washington DC. She incorporates the styles of all these locales in her home. She has been

One of Dean’s legendary pizzas.

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Above the fireplace hangs Hung Liu, Apple, mixed media on panel; custom sofa in Holland & Sherry fabric; Holly Hunt lounge chairs in Créations Métaphores fabric; Créations Métaphores sheer shades; Rose Tarlow glazed linen drapery.

From left to right: Clothespin console from Scott + Cooner with Jan Barboglio candelabra; above it hangs Rivers by Jim Yarbrough from Woodstock, Georgie. Above: Leah Rosenberg, Convergence, 2009, acrylic on panel—the artist describes it as dripping like frosting on a cake; Andy Katz, Tuscany Forest photograph is installed above a bar cart from Antique Row, Dallas; vintage floor lamp, a Wanda find; rug

by Liora Manne.

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In the library: custom chairs by Dan Nelson in Kelly Wearstler fabric; custom rug by Liora Manne; vintage light fixture by David Weeks; Elitis wallcovering inside the bookcase.

chief marketing and merchandising officer for Design Within Reach; chief marketing officer for Neiman Marcus Group; and she is presently global chief marketing and content officer for Cinemark, the American movie theatre company, overseeing the company's relationship with Hollywood studios and determining which and where movies will be released in theaters. Design and the creative process have always been part of her storied career.

The couple decided their shared home would be the one Dean had lived in with his sons, but they also created a space for Wanda’s daughter, Celese, who comes home on breaks from college at Vanderbilt. They had some work to do. Wanda worked closely with Bruce Bernbaum and Dan Nelson to create a home that combined both their lifestyles. “Dean and I interact so much with the public in fast-paced jobs that we need a place that is a quiet retreat— comfortable yet stylish. So when we walk in the door, we feel instant relaxation.” A warm “welcome home” comes by way of two permanent residents—a cat named Gumbo, and Walker, a border collie.

The design team of Greenwald, Bernbaum, and Nelson moved a door in the front entryway, converted the little-used dining room into an elegant and cozy library, and opened most of the back of the house to the backyard with a seamless sliding-door system. The porch has fans and electric screens that raise and lower as needed, providing a year-round temperate and mosquito-free environment.

The lacquered library shows off Ariamna Contino, Camino al Eden Corredor Entre, hand-cut paper, 200-gram Fabriano cardstock, acquired from the Robert Miller Gallery at Dallas Art Fair.

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Wanda discovered the original Richard Avedon Look magazine Beatles posters in a vintage poster shop.

For most of the pandemic, the couple retreated to their new patio and enjoyed the massive pecan trees and a wall of fragrant wisteria.

The focal point of the open kitchen is a large photograph. The late, great photographer Greg Booth captured then-six-month-old Jaxson, Dean’s son, holding a mixing spoon that belonged to Dean’s grandmother. It’s a multi-generational tribute to a kitchen that gets a lot of use. “I do all the cooking, and Wanda sets a beautiful table and pours a mean glass of wine,” Dean says. And there is always taco night. “We love them and are the luckiest people to live in the part of the world that knows how to cook tacos right,” says Dean. He also likes to cook Indian curry and Asian, Italian, French, and other dishes that he doesn’t serve in his restaurant. Entertaining is casual and unpretentious—he doesn’t want to spend all evening cooking when that’s what he does all day. Think pizza from their pizza oven (a gift from Wanda) and barbecue chicken off his Hasty Bake grill.

Every space in this home is put to use. The living room has an angular custom-designed sofa that invites conversation. The mixedmedia painting over the fireplace, Apple, is by celebrated Chinese artist Hung Liu. The walls, ceiling, and bookshelves of the study are lacquered in a celestial shade of blue that creates a reflective, Zen atmosphere.

The shelves are lined with art, books, and there is a special place for Dean’s many culinary trophies and awards. A custom cloverleaf table is perfect for table games, writing, and reading. The mixedmedia, hand-cut work on paper, Camino al Eden Corredor Entre, is by

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Dean Fearing’s collection of custom-made Lucchese boots.

Cuban artist Ariamna Contino, a discovery at the Dallas Art Fair.

In the great room, a custom sectional by Nelson provides ample comfortable seating with sculptural cutaway backs that keep the room open and the conversation going while food is being prepared in the kitchen. Above the fireplace is Sugar by Wes Lang. Bruce Cascia’s iconic image of a horse and rider is synonymous with Jackson Hole, Wyoming, one of the couple’s favorite places to visit. To the right of the bookshelves hangs Portrait of Young Woman #3 by Gugger Petter, made entirely of rolled-up newspapers.

Drawing from an eclectic lens, up the staircase hang four psychedelic prints of the Beatles, photographed by Richard Avedon for Look, a find

by Wanda at a San Francisco vintage poster shop. And you can’t miss a custom display case for the iconic chef’s collection of boots in a range of colors and designs, each pair beautifully handmade. And they’re not just for show: Dean pulls out a well-loved pair he wears every day.

He also points out one of his favorites: red custom-tooled Lucchese boots given to him in 1985 by the president of the distinguished boot company.

Dean collects vintage guitars as well; two of his dearest are a 1935 Martin Shade Top D-28 and a 1952 Fender Telecaster. Not just for show either: he plays regularly on his own and in his alternative country band, The Barbwires, along with his good friend, the accomplished chef Robert del Grande of Cafe Annie fame in Houston. He also strums at home after the evening meal, and of course The Barbwires perform regularly at charity events—talk about a musical feast! P

The great room shows off a custom sectional sofa in Perennials’ fabric with Artifort Tulip chairs from Scott + Cooner and a rug by the Scott Group Studio; Wes Lang’s Sugar adds dimension above the fireplace with a patinized steel surround by The Nelson Line. Gugger Petter’s newspaper-and-hemp Portrait of Young Woman #3 hangs to the right, with two paper collage faces by Brenda Bogart opposite left.

The patio respite features lounge furniture by RH.

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