Richard Rodriguez
From the left, Brad Davidson and Scott Sangalli.
It’s not shocking to learn that Scott Sangalli, CEO and chief home designer for The Morrison Group, was at one point the youngest person to pass the CPA exam. After all, accounting requires precision and attention to detail — one decimal point off or one number incorrect, and it could result in something catastrophic. Sangalli applies this same meticulous and exacting approach to homebuilding.
“An architect or a home designer will tell you, if they do it right, that everything's there for a reason,” Sangalli says. “Our designs are a very personal thing. Every wall is there for a reason; everything is in a certain spot for a reason. Not three inches this way or three inches that way. It's like a Jenga thing. You can't just pull out something and the rest of it works.”
Sangalli designs 99% of the houses The Morrison Group builds, and when I label him a “perfectionist for pragmatic design,” he says, “Exactly. Everything needs to make sense to live a comfortable life.”
In many ways, Sangalli works backward. He first thinks of the end product — everything and everybody that’s going in the house. Where will the furniture go? What if there’s a party? What if there are two people trying to get through this part of the kitchen? He avoids designing or building homes with hot trends or fads with little concern with what goes where. Point being, the space should never hinder one’s ability to do what he or she wants — to live comfortably.
“I don't want any room, whether it's a guest bedroom or whatever, to have a door in the wrong place or for the beds not to fit,” Sangalli says.
According to the builder, there are a lot of homes priced in the millions that look good on the outside — they have a “wow” factor, a façade that impresses — but the layouts are questionable. Does the fact passersby correctly assume the home’s impressive, million-dollar price tag mean the buyer got his or her money’s worth? Sangalli shares a brilliant metaphor.
“Let’s say you spend 200 bucks on a pair of jeans, all right? And you go to the gala or whatever wearing the jeans, and you’re looking pretty good, but the jeans don't feel good. If you have to wear those jeans every day for the rest of your life, you're going to be really upset. To me, if you're going to pay 200 bucks for a pair of jeans, they should feel better than anything you've had on your body because you've got to wear them for the next 10 years. And that's the way I look at a house. It's got to be pretty, but most importantly, it's got to be as comfortable as those set of jeans.”
And it’s this precision, attention to detail, and keen understanding of how people occupy and live in a space that Sangalli and his team at The Morrison Group, which includes senior project manager Brad Davidson, will bring to the 2025 Fort Worth Magazine Dream Home. The Dream Home, celebrating its 25th anniversary, is a collaboration with the industry’s top local professionals that showcases the latest in homebuilding techniques, design, and technology. The Morrison Group is currently constructing the Dream Home in the West Fort Worth neighborhood of Montrachet.
While The Morrison Group was founded over 30 years ago, Sangalli’s been building homes since he was, well, a kid.
“My dad was kind of a part-time builder,” Sangalli says. “He worked at Caterpillar, but we always built our own homes. In other words, we'd build a home and move into it, and then within a year or two, he'd start building another one.”
Sangalli would get his start in the industry with a clever idea to build entire neighborhoods of small, 1,200- to 1,800-square-foot homes with smart design, rear-entry garages, and deed restrictions on parking. At a time when the market was struggling, his homes were selling like hotcakes.
“We never finished a home that wasn't sold up,” Sangalli says.
Following this venture, The Morrison Group has its origin story connected to the 1992 Street of Dreams (not to be confused with the Dream Home or Dream Street, mind you), a multihome showcase in Mira Vista, where Sangalli happened to be building a home for himself.
When one of the builders backed out of the project, Mira Vista approached Sangalli on taking his place. The only problem: It was December and the Street of Dreams was scheduled for May. He had 4 1/2 months to complete the project.
“So, we built the home and got it done with maybe a day to spare,” Sangalli says. “Well, we won all the architectural awards, both public and private. Won the landscape award, won the decorating award for all the homes, won the customer's favorite home, and all that. Well, I got like 15 build jobs off that thing.
“And that’s how it all started.”
A few years later, in 2000, The Morrison Group was builder of Fort Worth Magazine’s inaugural Dream Home. While styles, trends, and techniques have changed, thanks to Sangalli and The Morrison Group’s dedication to timeless design, the first home feels as fresh today as it did at the turn of the century.
Despite the positive press and a stellar product, The Morrison Group has remained a boutique builder. According to Sangalli, “We're always going to be the little guys. I'm never going to be a production builder because that's not where our love is. We enjoy so much building things that people walk in and go, ‘I can't wait to move in.’ That's the greatest feeling in the world.”
Touring for the Dream Home will be in May 2025. Be sure to visit the site, dream.fwtx.com, for updates.
