International design authority Architectural Digest has selected the most beautiful coffee shop in each state, and it's a Dallas location of an Austin brand that takes the crown in Texas.
Houndstooth Coffee at Sylvan | Thirty gets praise for how its "soaring ceiling with an accordion effect and an all-white interior (with pops of heather gray) ... make the floating island — where all java drinks are made — pop."
That's a lot of popping. Dallas-based architecture and interiors studio Official designed the location, which is the second of three in Dallas. The first opened on Henderson Avenue in 2014, and the latest is adjacent to sustainable home improvement store TreeHouse, at Walnut Hill Lane and US-75. Houndstooth was founded in Austin in 2010, where there are now two locations.
To compile its list, Architectural Digest said it was looking for coffee shops that perfectly reflect the character of their surrounding communities, and noted that many are "tapping into design trends with salvaged barn wood, ball-pendant lights, greenery, and hexagonal tiles. That fresh, modern white-wall look is in abundance, too, putting yesterday’s run-of-the-mill cafes with mismatched furnishings and dark colors to shame."
The Sylvan | Thirty Houndstooth is indeed fresh, modern, and mostly white, with finishing materials that are a combination of white oak, walnut, Spanish cedar, raw and painted steel, perforated steel, and quartz. It was a 2016 AIA Dallas Built Design Honor Award recipient. The group at Official notes that the space was built for a 360-degree experience and to maximize interactions between guests and the barista.
However, Architectural Digest doesn't mention Houndstooth's adjoining cocktail bar, Jettison, which patrons can reach through a corridor with sliding doors when they're ready to move on to the hard stuff. Also designed by Official, Jettison has darker finishes but retains the same gold accents as Houndstooth, in order to tie the two spaces together.
Houndstooth at Sylvan | Thirty was designed by Official, a Dallas-based firm.
