Refreshing Green
Photo: Colleen Duffley
Cara and Robert Barnes's plans for their 2006 wedding did not include searching for a new residence. But after obliging a realtor friend who insisted they see a classic midcentury modern Oklahoma City property, the couple began to dream.
The 2,700-square-foot, three-bedroom house looked "very unprepossessing from the front," Cara recalls. "Our 'wow' moment came when we stood in the entry hall. It was late in the year, but all of this light was streaming in. We just looked at each other and said, 'Can you imagine living and entertaining here?'" The newlyweds— she a PR and marketing consultant, he an attorney who specializes in the oil-and-gas industry—wound up closing on the house the day after returning from their honeymoon.
Designed and built in 1957, the house was the first commission by local architect George Seminoff, a protégé of Bruce Goff, who was celebrated for designing homes with multi-sided rooms. The lowslung house shows the organic influence of Goff as well as that of Frank Lloyd Wright. The physical structure had been well preserved over the home's first half-century, but there were changes to be made for the next.
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