Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House … In Preston Hollow — 1948
by Paula Bosse
The Blandings Dream House in Preston Hollow… (click for larger image)
by Paula Bosse
I watch a lot of old movies, and one of my favorites has always been Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, the 1948 comedy about the trials and tribulations of home renovation and construction starring Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, and Melvyn Douglas. It wasn’t until fairly recently that I learned there had been a nationwide promotion in which replicas of the “dream house” were built in cities around the country. And, to my surprise, one of those houses was built in Dallas! To be exact, in Preston Hollow. To be precise, at 5423 Walnut Hill Lane (the northwest corner of Walnut Hill and Hollow Way). Sadly, when I went looking for it last week, I found an empty lot. (Figures.) The photo above shows the house in September, 1948 when it (and, not so coincidentally, the movie) opened to the public.
Ahead of the movie’s release, Selznick Studios approached local builders around the country and provided them with architectural plans, asking that they build houses as near to the specifications of the movie house as conditions would permit. The studio contracted Dallas builder A. Pollard Simons and supervising architect Lucien O’Brien to work on the Dallas dream house, seen below in a rendering (all images are larger when clicked).
Simons greatly increased the size of the original two-story, three-bedroom house quite a bit (of course he did!), and he allowed the Junior League to raise money by selling 25-cent tickets to curious dream-house-wanters clamoring to wander through the house and gawk at its plush interior and its state-of-the art appliances. Afterwards, Simons put the completely furnished house on the market (in some cities the houses were put up as raffle prizes), and life, presumably, returned to normal for all concerned.
It was a clever way to promote the movie, and, as most of the contractors rushed to boast of their participation by taking out large ads (likely bought in conjunction with studio money), it was also an advertising bonanza for local newspapers. In amongst such ads I discovered that the company owned by my mother’s uncle and my grandfather — Fred Werry Electric Co. — did all the electrical work for the house!
Below are some of those ads that appeared at the time — and, trust me, this was just the tip of the iceberg. The ads were non-stop. This was a huge campaign, going far beyond traditional Hollywood promotion — and it certainly paid off. I’m fairly certain that most Dallasites who read the paper during that time were aware of the house (and the movie), even if they had absolutely no interest in houses (or movies). It was that that unavoidable. (Scroll to the bottom of this post to listen to a FABULOUS commercial-slash-PSA made by actor Melvyn Douglas at a local radio station during a trip to Dallas to tour the Preston Hollow house.)
There were other Texas “Dream Houses” built in Fort Worth (still standing, see link at bottom of page), Austin, Houston, and Amarillo. I only wish Dallas still had its “Dream House,” but I fear a tasteful-but-puny, little ol’ 3,000-square-foot house would not meet today’s definition of a “dream house” in ultra-swanky Preston Hollow.
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The Ford people got into the advertising. This appears to be have been taken in front of the Dallas house.
My great-uncle and grandfather! I can now claim my six degrees of separation (LESS!) from Cary, Myrna, and Melvyn.
Kitchen porn from Lang’s.
The Baptist Book Store stocked the shelves of the Blandings library!
I really like the Wyatt’s Cafeteria ad below, which begins with an itinerary. “Program for today: go to church, eat at Wyatt’s, drive out to see the Mr. Blandings’ ‘Dream House’ in Preston Hollow.” This cafeteria ad sneaked in a mention of the Wyatt’s grocery stores by informing the reader that they had supplied the food for the Dream House’s refrigerator and pantry shelves. But this was my favorite part: “When Mr. Blandings takes his family out for a delicious meal you may rest assured that he will take them to a Wyatt’s De Luxe Cafeteria where each may choose the foods of his own liking from Wyatt’s tremendous varieties. Mr. Blandings won’t mind paying the bill because Wyatt’s prices are really modest.” If Cary Grant was going to be dining at a Dallas cafeteria, I only hope he was choking down large slabs of Wham.
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The original “dream house” from Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House — cute, but much smaller than its Dallas counterpart.
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Sources & Notes
All ads relating to the Dallas Dream House appeared throughout September, 1948.
A nice look at the still-standing Fort Worth Dream House can be found in “Standing at the Corner of Hollywood and Cowtown,” here.
A short radio promo about the Preston Hollow Dream House was recorded on Aug. 10, 1948 by the wonderful Melvyn Douglas, one of the stars of the film (who, by the way, went on to win an Oscar for his role as the family patriarch in the brilliant — and iconically Texan — film Hud in 1963). It was recorded when he visited Dallas in August, 1948 at station KIXL (in which he was an investor), and it can be heard here. (By permission of the great Dallas DJ and broadcasting archivist, George Gimarc.) I LOVE THIS! Thank you, George!
UPDATE: I wrote this post in 2014, and at the time I could find no information about this Dallas Blandings house outside contemporary newspaper archives. Which is the only reason I took some small amount of credit for the house showing up in a Preston Hollow-centric mural in 2015 at the then-new Trader Joe’s at Walnut Hill and Central. I took the photo below in 2015, but, sadly, this tribute to Mr. Blandings and his Dallas dream house is no more. Last time I stopped in, it had been painted over. But here it lives on!
Trader Joe’s, Walnut Hill, Dallas (photo by Paula Bosse, 2015)
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Copyright © 2014 Paula Bosse. All Rights Reserved.
Flashback : Dallas 
[…] And what of the Dallas Blandings house after the publicity blitz ended? The house was still standing in 2012 when I began researching the Fort Worth Blandings house but has since been torn down. (More on the Dallas house at Flashback Dallas.) […]
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[…] few weeks ago, I wrote about the “Blandings Dream House” promotion in which the marketing department of the studio behind the Cary Grant movie “Mr. […]
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Thank you for this. It was so interesting. My aunt, father’s ester, was married to Pollard at the time. My father did the landscaping. I loved this house and love the movie. Such a wonderful walk down memory lane. My mother worked for Nardis of Dallas for several years and he brought back the fabric for her wedding dress from a european trip.
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And that’s my father’s sister. I didn’t catch a couple of things till too late. Also my mother was a dress designer as well as Interior Decorator. Dad also did a lot homes in Highland Park and including this area.
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Wow — personal connections to two of my favorite post topics — the Blandings house and Nardis! I LOVE the movie, and I was excited to find out that one had been built here, but so sad when I discovered it had been demolished (fairly recently, I think). Who knows — while working on the landscaping, your father could have bumped into my grandfather doing the electrical work! Thanks for commenting, Becky!
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Sadly I just saw this. Your grandfather probably did a lot of work for Uncle Pollard. He was built a lot of homes during this time. What a great connection indeed. Than you too for commenting. Love to think our families crossed paths.
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[…] “Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House … In Preston Hollow — 1948.” If you love the Cary Grant-Myrna Loy movie, you’ll enjoy this. My favorite thing here is the recording of a promo that actor Melvyn Douglas did for a Dallas radio station when he was in town. It’s at the end of the post. It’s great. […]
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I happen to have a list of all the cities where these replica “Blandings” homes were built. It’s printed in the July, 1948 issue of American Builder magazine, which I happen to collect.
There is a list printed at the bottom of an advertising page. I think there’s about 60 listed, but it’s just cities, no street addresses. If anyone is interested, I’d be happy to copy the list into a message here.
I’ll check back from time to time to see if anyone would like the list. There are, of course, a few states with multiple cities involved, like Texas, California, and even more than one in Indiana!
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Thanks, sdaven5191! I’m sure someone will be interested — this post gets an amazing number of hits.
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I would appreciate a list of addresses.
Thank you,
Gilbert
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To sdaven5191
Where in Indiana? Thanks
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According to this list
http://www.liquisearch.com/mr_blandings_builds_his_dream_house/promotion
houses were built in Indianapolis (6416 Dean Rd), Terre Haute (2400 Ohio Blvd) and South Bend (522 N Greenlawn Av).
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Was a “Mr. Blanding’s House” built in Chattanooga, Tennessee? Does anyone know the address ?
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There was a house built in Chattanooga but I haven’t been able to track down the address. The list I compiled can be found on this site-
http://www.robertabalos.com/2017/02/blanding-house-locations.html
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Did a bit more research and I can tell you that the Chattanooga area house was built in East Ridge, in the Belvoir neighborhood and a few blocks from the intersection of South Terrace and Sweetbriar Ave. Hope that helps.
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Sounds like 225 S Sweetbriar Ave
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I would like a list and addresses of homes Austin Texas.
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I found 61 of the Blandings houses. I created a Pinterest page with photos and links to further information but, due to a hiccup with Pinterest, at present only the photos show up. Pinterest is “working on it.” Here’s the page-https://www.pinterest.com/EricVedo/the-real-mr-blandings-dream-houses/
The Austin house looks nothing like the movie house. It’s ultra-modern and was designed by Fehr & Granger. 4902 Balcones Drive. Here’s what it looked like when new-https://www.pinterest.com/pin/671388256921772667/
The other Texas Blandings houses are Amarillo (2813 Parker St), Corpus Christi (328 Jackson Pl), Fort Worth (3801 Arundel Av), Harlingen (905 E Pierce Av), Houston (3702 Glen Haven Blvd), and San Antonio (2505 W Gramercy Pl). For Gilbert, the Tennessee Blandings houses are Chattanooga (225 S Sweetbriar Ave), Knoxville (3559 Iskagna Dr SW), Memphis (4390 Chickasaw Rd), and Nashville (4435 E Brookfield Dr) which was razed. I’d be happy to send the list I compiled to interested parties. iratevirgo at comcast.net.
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My dad, Verner E. Brown, owner of Highland Nurseries, did the landscaping for the Dalkas home. A Pollard Simons was my uncle. He was married at the time to my dads sister and they had one child together. Later he remarried and had had another child.
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