• Story by Amanda Keefe

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Megan and Dave Myers' home is special. Not just because the architect couple poured serious time and money into renovating the 1926 bungalow, and not just because of the intricate aesthetics the two envisioned upon purchasing it.

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No, the little house located at 914 McPherson in Alton is special because, for 70 years, it belonged to Megan's grandmother - its roots are as deep as the generations who spent time in it.

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"For me growing up, it was always fantastic, " said Megan, an Alton native who in her youth, lived just two doors down from her Grandma Helen.  "We used to ride bikes out in the alley.  I still love the atmosphere of it."

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In 2004, Megan made a welcome return to the home she knew so well when she and Dave purchased it when her grandmother died.  While the Myers - who met at the prestigious Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture - recognized the home was in fairly good shape, they also acknowledged its need for an upgrade into the 21st century.

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Together, the architects would tackle the home in an attempt to modernize it, yet keep the integrity of the era in which it was constructed.

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To do it right, the Myers dusted off a few old black and white snapshots of the structure.

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"We spent some time with my aunt looking through family photos of the house," Megan said.  "Instead of 'Oh there's Grandma' it was 'Let's see what this house looked like originally."

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"We took those pictures and tried to reinterpret and re-envision and modernize to a degree, but we also wanted to maintain the characte and the time period," she added.

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The home would be the couple's first design they did together.  In it, they would start a family (two children and two dogs), and enter promising careers that reflected the painstaking efforts they took as architects.

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Dave works at PGAV Destinations in St. Louis, a company responsible for designing museums, theme parks, aquariums and the like.  One of the bigger projects he tackled involved NASA's Space Shuttle Atlantis Exhibit at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

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"We worked on it for almost three years," Dave said, noting the family's stint in Florida from 2010 to 2013.  The Myers travelled back to and forth from their Alton home to Florida during that time, the bungalow virtually completed.

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Upon returning to Alton, Megan launched her own architectural business, Side Road Studio.  To cater to her creativity, the two designed a perfect workspace on the home's second floor, which was once the attic.

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In fact, the former attic now boasts a master suite, a full bath and their daughter Esme's room.  Additionally inset bookshelves line the walls, brimming with inspiration for the architects, including of course, Frank Lloyd Wright's greatest works.

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Downstairs, the architects exposed the home's original hardwood floors - which in Grandma Helen's years, were covered by mint green carpeting - and shifted walls and space to allow for a formal entryway where a bedroom once stood, and their son Linus' room.  The Myers also added a back porch to the kitchen and rebuilt a detached garage behind the property.

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An element the couple doesn't necessarily want visitors to notice directly, bud added intenionally to their home, is accents in threes.

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"If you look around the house, everything is in threes." Dave said "When you're designing, you don't want even numbers.  It's more aesthetically pleasing when you have odd numbers."

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"The house is designed so that when people come in, they like it, but they don't know hwy," he added.

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And if visitors should take a closer look, they'll begin to notice the pattern.  Three windows in the living room, three black squares on the kitchen's cabinet knobs, three blue lights hanging above the kitchen island and the trend continues.

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To date, the home on McPherson is basically complete, racking up roughly $90,000 in remodeling work.  The couple initially planned on living in it for just five years but that deadline has come and gone.  Though the Myers renovated the home with the intention to sell, they ended up staying and raising a family.

 

They're not sure whether they plan to move int he future, but they can safely say 914 McPherson was a lesson in patience, teamwork and love.

 

"Throughout the whole process, we both had different ideas," Dave said. "But the compromise always ended up being the best ideas."

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