Beverly Drive Renovators Invite Neighbors to Follow Along

Instagram account tracks construction progress, welcomes suggestions

Daniel Murphy and Adam Saxton weren’t necessarily looking for a renovation project when they bought their nearly 100-year-old Beverly Drive home last spring, but once the idea was planted, they “really couldn’t shake it.”

“We were drawn to the Highland Park area because we really liked the sense of community,” Saxton, an SMU alumnus, said. 

“I’ve built a number of houses, but I’ve never done a remodel,” he continued. “I don’t think we sought out to do a remodel or a restoration or to buy a historic home.”

However, when their real estate agent showed the couple the Beverly Drive home, they “looked at it once and made an offer.”

Some records indicate the home was built in 1930, but Saxton and Murphy shared an advertisement for the home they say ran in the Dallas Morning News in 1929. They also have an excerpt from the book Great American Suburbs: The Homes of the Park Cities that mentioned their home and noted that its architect was unknown.

“With the setting of Beverly Drive being what it is and finding that house that fits so appropriately into its setting with that old oak tree in the front and that kind of classic, idealized version of Highland Park facade in place — I think it was pretty clear that we didn’t want to touch that,” Saxton said.

For their project, the pair enlisted the help of architect William S. Briggs, who served on the board of Preservation Park Cities.

“This property had the flexibility to allow us to leave all of that beautiful facade that you see from the street exactly as it is today,” Saxon said, while still allowing “us to add on in the back and do it in such a way (to) make a modern home for our family.”

They began sharing the renovation process with the community on social media shortly after they bought their home, which they dubbed the “Beverly Casa.”

“We wanted to show people … what this process was like from a homeowner’s perspective,” Saxton said. “These homes can be transformed to modern living without any compromise … that’s what we’re trying to share throughout the journey.”

An Instagram account for the Beverly Casa has since drawn more than 12,000 followers. Murphy and Saxton say they’ve made connections with their neighbors before they could move in and have been surprised by the community’s interest in their home and project.

“It’s probably upward of 20 people at this point who have had some sort of personal connection to the house that have reached out — people that either lived there or had a friend who lived there,” Murphy said. 

“We will know and have met and been introduced to dozens and dozens of neighbors long before we’ve ever slept a single night in that house, and I think that that is what motivates us to keep going,” Saxton added.