Esperanza House

“We have fabulous weather here — about 320 days of sunshine a year. We really try to optimize indoor and outdoor together.“
— Matt Hollaway

Esperanza House is a modern Boerne home built on a careful palette of materials — linear stone, structural red iron, stucco, and Western red cedar siding. The cedar was a substitution made during construction: the design originally called for metal cladding, but one of the team’s contractors sourced beautiful Western red cedar instead, and the same wood was carried inside the home — onto the fireplace surround, the kitchen, and the master bedroom — to pull the exterior language indoors.

The house is designed around large multi-slide doors. The living room opens directly onto the patio; the adjoining game room and bar opens to the outdoor kitchen. When the doors are open, the indoor and outdoor spaces become a single connected entertaining environment; when the weather turns, they close to climate-controlled rooms with full views. The outdoor kitchen carries the usual gas grill plus an unusual addition — a live-fire table island that allows cooking directly on its surface.

Attached but with its own separate entry, an integrated casita serves as guest quarters, an aging-parent suite, or a freestanding home office for clients who keep clients of their own. And because the owners are committed dog people, the home includes a climate-controlled dog room attached to the master, complete with a bath, drain, and hose — a true room, not a converted closet.

The home was designed by architect Fernando — one of the Hollaway team’s longest-running collaborators — and built in Boerne, where the firm has decades of experience navigating a city whose growth has outpaced its permitting and inspection infrastructure. The team treats those friction points as part of the job: stay on top of the city’s changing processes, react quickly, and keep the homeowner clear of the inconvenience.

The standout construction adaptation came mid-build, when a contractor sourced Western red cedar in place of the planned metal cladding. Rather than simply approve the swap, the team carried the material throughout the home — adding cedar accents on the interior fireplace, the kitchen, and into the master bedroom — turning a substitution into a unifying design element.

Other distinct moments in the build included the manufactured-stone exterior (a departure from the real-stone facades used on other projects in the portfolio), the exposed red iron structural and decorative work, the metal windows, and the integrated casita with its own private entry.

Best Product Design Custom Build $750,000-$1,000,000 (GSABA Summit Award)

Esperanza House was featured in a San Antonio Express-News architectural article highlighting Fernando’s modern home design — a public recognition of the home’s place in the broader Hill Country modern conversation.