The family compound
Man builds luxurious home so he doesn’t miss life with tight-knit brood
Reggie Van Lee stretches his long legs out from a plush chair in his spacious Wharton home to talk about his home and his life.
His sisters are buzzing around with their children and grandchildren as others move chairs, set up tables and prepare food for a party to mark the birthday and retirement of Van Lee’s brother-inlaw, Mark Szafarz.
Van Lee takes it all in, smiling as his niece, Emily Szafarz, scurries after her 18-month-old son, Tommy, who’s run off with a balloon.
The 59-year-old created this place — so much more than a home — so his family could live together. The idea was hatched years ago when he was a student at MIT in Boston.
One of many brushes with celebrity throughout his life, Van Lee and Caroline Kennedy had a mutual friend, and she invited the two to visit Hyannis Port one weekend.
He was a sophomore in college — not long out of the protective shell of his tight-knit family in Houston’s Sunnyside neighborhood — and he was awestruck.
Someday, he told himself, he wanted to build a place to share with his sisters and his parents.
It took a while, but he did. His dream has come full circle.
His sister Tommye Szafarz knew all along that it could someday happen. Their parents were aging and needed help, then their sister Eva Watkins became ill, and someone said, “Wouldn’t it be great if we were all in one place?”
“When Reginald starts a project, everyone knows at some point it will come to fruition,” she said. “Once he sets his mind on a project, it is going to happen.”
Today, he and his three sisters and brother-inlaw share a one-level, 20,000-square-foot home on land in Wharton that was purchased by their great-grandmother Susan Freeman Jones Jefferson in 1899.
They’re all in
A grand piano shares space with artwork just off the foyer, capped with a glittery Hudson chandelier dripping with strands of gold chain. To the other side is their banquet hall, a giant dining area usually set up with a table for 24.
Today, though, it’s where the party will be later in the afternoon.
A huge living room filled with curvy Christopher Guy chairs and sofas arranged in several small groupings is the center of the home. There’s also a grotto bar for refreshments, plus a huge kitchen with two islands and enough cabinet and cooking space for a small restaurant.
Designed by architect John Sullivan of Sullivan, Henry, Oggero and Associates in Spring Valley, the 300-footwide home is a series of intimate spaces connected by halls and art-filled galleries.
Elsewhere is more private space, with quarters for Van Lee and Corey McCathern, his husband of nearly six years, on the north side of the home.
On the south side are “casitas,” small apartments for his sisters — Carolyn Conner, Tommye Szafarz and her husband, Mark, and Anita Lee — all accessed by a common hallway. Another sister, Eva Watkins, died during construction; a chapel in the home is named in her honor.
A small hair salon was created on the sisters’ side because Van Lee didn’t want them to have to drive all the way to Houston every week or so to get their hair done. Instead, a niece who owns the salon Mass Appeal drives down to take care of them.
If he’d been able to persuade his 98-year-old aunt, Maggie Jefferson Prince, to leave Houston for Wharton, she’d be here, too. A guest room is waiting just for her, decked out in bold neoclassical Versace style.
“She’s set in her ways. She said to me, ‘You know no one will come out there,’ ” Van Lee said, mimicking the voice of his elderly aunt. “But people come, and sometimes they bring suitcases.”
Tommye Szafarz said the large family home is a product of their upbringing. “That is my mother’s influence. She taught us that all you have is your family, and you have got to stick together. It was very important to her, and that’s why we do it.”
The north side of the home is opulent, filled with art that Van Lee has collected through dealers and his world travels.
One area meant to be a spa — a sauna, massage room and prep room — is now a guest area for visitors. Further inside are a tiny kitchen (“Kitchens are for refrigerating and microwaving,” he said) and a larger living/dining area where Van Lee holds court with friends.
Decorating the home has been the work of Van Lee’s longtime interior designer, Philip Sheffield of Sheffield Design Group, who finds himself at the home a few times a month, tweaking arrangements, hanging art or placing new accessories.
“I’m still a little nervous sometimes, but Reggie just says, ‘You know what I like,’ ” Sheffield said. “With that comes a lot of responsibility. We’ve become friends over the years, of course.”
Van Lee loves color, bold style and dramatic design. Sheffield cites neoclassical as Van Lee’s favorite style, and pieces by his late friend Gianni Versace are scattered throughout his home.
“There’s a story behind every piece,” Van Lee said as he pointed to a large artwork on one wall. “I got this in Vietnam when we were on one of my birthday trips. We walked in this gallery, and this piece was suspended from the ceiling. I said ‘I want this,’ and they said, ‘It’s not for sale.’ I said, ‘Everything’s for sale.’ ”
Much of his art is purchased through dealers, and most is by African-American artists. A patron of the arts, he is a trustee of the Studio Museum of Harlem and the Washington Ballet and has supported many arts and dance groups.
He has pieces by esteemed artists such as Frank Bowling and Norman Lewis, but his eclectic taste also brings in sculpture by Kehinde Wiley and stenciled glyphs by Cheryl Riley.
Hallways and galleries leading to his sisters’ casitas are filled with more, a big piece by Gregory Coates made of chicken feathers painted pink, a series of photos mixed with paint by Cedric Smith and a collection of subtle portraits of black women by Chris Shelton among them.
Five mothers
Van Lee’s love of his sisters, all retired teachers, runs deep. The youngest, he jokes that he was raised by five mothers.
He and his sisters had strict, God-fearing parents — Tommie Lee, a postal worker, and Eva Elnora Jefferson Lee, a nurse — who instilled the virtues of honesty and respect. At school, academics were more important than extracurricular activities. If he’s in town on weekends, he still attends the family church, Blue Ridge United Methodist.
Instead of attending ball games in high school, Van Lee was active in the Slide Rule Club and participated in the science fair, speech and drama. “I was a nerd,” he said matter-of-factly.
“We were all nerds,” Conner chimed in.
He was watching “Star Trek” one day, and there was a reference to MIT. “What’s MIT?” he asked his mother.
She didn’t know, but they figured it out, and that’s when Van Lee decided that he would attend MIT. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees there and later earned an MBA from Harvard. Van Lee loved his years in Boston and later served as a trustee at MIT; this year he received its Martin Luther King Jr. Leadership Award.
He worked for Exxon for a couple of years, then shifted to Booz Allen Hamilton where he worked for 32 years, retiring as an executive vice president in its Washington office.
He worked in Houston for a while but spent many years in New York and Washington, D.C. He traveled the world for his employer, meeting his husband on a trip to Milan. The couple has been together 14 years.
McCathern was working as a model in Italy and later became a personal trainer. For the past four years, he’s owned a fried chicken joint, Corey’s Soul Chicken, in Milan.
A touch of whimsy
From a travertine-lined patio, visitors look out beyond a cool blue pool to a different backyard diversion. There’s a catfish pond and a vintage RV, a sparkling 1960s Avion that Lee had shipped to Wharton just for fun. A few years ago, Sheffield stepped in again to revamp the whole thing, including plush custom-made pullout beds and a pullout dining table.
It doesn’t get much use, except when the grandkids head out back for the afternoon. They fish for a while and then head to the trailer.
“They call it camping,” Sheffield said. “They have no idea they’re napping on Italian sheets and Versace pillows.”