This past weekend I traveled to Oklahoma City (OKC) to tour some houses in the Parade of Homes. Primarily, I went to see The Lookout by McGregor Homes because it has a similar floor plan and square footage to the home I’m designing for my build. As a bonus, the interior design is spectacular. I’ve been stalking the house on Instagram for weeks and was really on-the-fence about whether to spend the money to travel to OKC for the weekend, but I’m really glad I did. It’s difficult to get a true feel for a home based solely on photos or videos online, and walking through the home gave me a better sense of the square footage and spaciousness in my design.
The things I absolutely adored:
- The stone in the entry hallway
- The dark beams that wrapped the entrances and ceilings
- The primary suite
Some things I loved that I wasn’t expecting to love:
- The 12′ ceilings in the main living areas. I thought it would be too high, but it really gave the rooms an open and airy feel without being too much. The kitchen, bathrooms, pantry, and mudroom looked closer to 10′, which felt cozy but not claustrophobic, and a much better height for taking cabinets to the ceiling.
- The warm and darker toned woods used throughout the home. I’ve definitely leaned hard into the white oak craze of the last decade and was planning on using a lot of it in my build, but I might now be persuaded to incorporate some other tones. I tend to shy away from red and orange wood tones because it reminds me too much of the 90’s, but perhaps those colors are making a comeback. They gave the house a more rustic and cozy feel.
- I didn’t even mind that the fridge and freezer weren’t paneled, it added a slight industrial feel to the rustic design.
Things I would change:
- Moving the fireplace from the office to the primary bedroom.
- Less square footage in the basement and more on the main level: a larger pantry and mudroom
- A plaster hood over the kitchen range and a solid stone backsplash instead of tile – the tile was beautiful but it felt too busy for my personal preference.
- Not as many kitchen cabinets as I would like, though I’m not sure how that would be fixed in that home without deleting the kitchen windows.
There were a lot of clever design elements that I want to incorporate into my own design, like this built-in laundry hamper in the primary bathroom vanities:
This was also my first time visiting Oklahoma. I primarily went to tour the parade, but it was hard not to look at OKC through the lens of what it’d be like to live there. There are obvious perks about the area, the low cost-of-living being the primary one. Land and housing are both much more affordable compared to Las Vegas, let alone most Western states. Gas was cheaper ($2.60/gallon!), groceries and eating out was surprisingly affordable, and from what people told me, property taxes are very low.
The first thing I noticed upon arrival was just how GREEN the city was. There were grass and trees everywhere. The lack of greenery is my biggest gripe with living in Las Vegas – I love the city itself, it’s a 4/5 for me, but the climate is a 1/5 and the largest reason I want to move. I really enjoyed driving through the Jones suburb of OKC and admiring the landscape. The weather was perfect during my trip – mostly sunny with light breezes.
Another thing I enjoyed about my visit was how spacious and open things are compared to Vegas. The houses aren’t built on top of each other – there is a decent amount of space between each one with good sized yards. Even business parks felt roomy. Driving in OKC was extremely pleasant. I didn’t encounter much traffic, getting from one side of the city to the other was quick, and the drivers weren’t so hostile. Even downtown was easy to navigate and I didn’t feel anxious or stressed looking for parking: street parking was abundant and easy to find.
Most of my time was spent looking at parade homes, but I did manage to do a few touristy things while I was there.
Went to the Botanical Gardens:
Stopped by Uptown Grocery for a snack and then went and walked by Lake Hefner to see the lighthouse:
Walked around Bricktown:
Visited a few bookstores: Half Price Books, Full Circle Books, and Commonplace Books. I also stopped by a Barnes & Noble and the one I visited was MUCH better than any in Vegas. Their selection of home and gardening books was much larger and they had plenty of “Buy One Get One 50% Off” deals, which the Vegas stores seem to have stopped doing.
Overall it was a lovely trip to Oklahoma City and I’m so happy I decided to go! I’m taking home lots of new design inspiration and ideas and will be busy over the next few weeks continuing to tweak my design.
Photos of the parade home are from the Zillow listing
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