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23 Apr 2025

TexTILES & Tech – Chic, Cheeky & Custom AF

Join Sarah Zubiate Bennett as she brings her passion for interior design to life in this stunning new episode. Sarah sits down with some seasoned pros at Texas Counter Fitters, home to some of the most awe-inspiring natural stone slabs around. Together, they explore the latest innovations in design — from textures and tones to tech-forward trends reshaping the way we live and decorate. Whether you’re a design enthusiast or simply love a beautifully curated space, this episode offers fresh inspiration straight from the experts. Don’t miss this insider look into the artistry and craft behind modern interiors!

0:00

Chris Blackburn

Guest

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Host

Nicole Arnold

Guest

Ria Urs

Guest

David Call

Guest

Debra Stewart

Guest

April Henegar

Guest

Episode Timeline

00:00

Intro

00:37

Tour of Texas Counter Fitters showroom with Chris Blackburn

06:14

Billy Schenck pieces in showroom

06:38

Kym Day pieces in showroom

09:24

Statue made of semiprecious stones

11:29

Interior design panel with discussion focused on AI

Full Transcript

00:00

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Hey friends. It's Sarah Zubiate Bennett and oh do I have something fabulous for you lined up. In this brand new segment, I'm sitting down with some incredibly talented design pros over at Texas Counter Fitters. And let me tell you, these folks are the real deal. We're talking jaw dropping slabs, cutting edge textures, swoon worthy tones, and tech innovations that'll have your design brain buzzing.

00:21

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

So grab your coffee, your cocktail, whatever suits your vibe, and let's dive in. Be sure to hit those like and subscribe buttons so you never miss out on the fun. So tell me your name.

00:37

Chris Blackburn

My name is Chris Blackburn.

00:39

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Chris Blackburn.

00:39

Chris Blackburn

I'm one of the owners of Texas Counter Fitters, me and my partner Andrew Gilbert.

00:42

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Well, we are thrilled to be here. And I know I've told you, but I'll tell everyone watching. So I have had the longest lifetime, I feel like, of this entire home renovation for our home in Highland Park, just forever. But it's because I'm doing it all in conjunction with the expertise at Premier Design to Completion. And so we are here today for a panel which y'all will see, but we're gonna get a little bit of a behind the scenes tour.

01:13

Chris Blackburn

This is the best hidden gem in Dallas. I promise you. I can't wait. You're gonna really impressed.

01:17

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

I cannot wait. And, oh my gosh. I mean, so many of these already just from afar look incredible. So please, I will follow you.

01:24

Chris Blackburn

Come on. So a lot of these pieces have really great stories behind them.

01:27

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Uh-huh.

01:29

Chris Blackburn

And I'm gonna get to a couple of these that are two of my faves. So everybody has Calcutta gold. What's the anomaly about this one is that you have the pyrite, which is fool's gold. It actually speckled speckled through the slab. That's makes it really true Calcutta gold.

01:45

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Do you have any Carrera here?

01:47

Chris Blackburn

Yes. We do have Carrera. That's more of a commodity white marble, so we keep a lot of that in the factory in Garland.

01:54

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh, got it.

01:54

Chris Blackburn

But, yes, it's a it's a known commodity.

01:58

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

So your factory is in Garland?

01:59

Chris Blackburn

We have a factory, a ginormous factory in Garland. We service most of the largest builders as far as fabrication to them, and we opened this showroom as a luxury item for to sell material because there's a big misconception, I think, in the marketplace that some distributors will label something rare. And at the end of day, you know, a lot of the Brazilians feel it's just a rock. And we also have really supported the fair market value. After all, you can't Google the price of a slab.

02:25

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

That's right.

02:26

Chris Blackburn

So it makes it very confusing to go into some place to look at material because you don't know what the price is. We'll give you the price. You know, we're gonna give your fabricator a better price because he's the one who's actually physically doing all the work. Of course. And that's only fair.

02:39

Chris Blackburn

But anybody can come in here, get a budget, get a quote, and know that they're in the going in the right direction instead of just coming here and not finding anything and leaving with is it expensive or not?

02:52

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

And so can just any random person off the street come in here?

02:55

Chris Blackburn

Yes. This is a retail showroom. We do have a lot of nice slabs, but we have artwork. We have stone carvings. We have garden features. Again, there's I think we represent over 20 artists in this place. So and as you look around, you gotta look in between the areas and see all the, I guess, tchotchke items per se.

03:18

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Yes. Okay. Well, let's let's keep going because I'm I'm already liking some of the art that I'm seeing.

03:23

Chris Blackburn

More sculptures, specimens. You'll see you'll keep seeing a handful of these around everywhere.

03:29

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

I am a geode collector. Since I've been a little girl, clearly, they've...

03:35

Chris Blackburn

Yeah. We have some

03:36

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Gotten nicer.

03:37

Chris Blackburn

Some phenomenal ones back here.

03:38

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh, wow.

03:41

Chris Blackburn

There's your geodes. All cut and glued together and milled down. Now, I don't really like the process they do, but these slabs, we have a few varieties of this particular geo where they put the geodes together. They're phenomenal.

03:53

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

This is insanely beautiful. At our our ranch, you know, si cheese? I'm sure si cheese, they're Italian. But, I had this entire floor created from different stones. Mhmm. And, they shipped it from Italy, and it is meant to mirror

04:15

Chris Blackburn

Yeah.

04:15

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Some geodes. Yeah. But in more earthy tones.

04:19

Chris Blackburn

Yes. Yeah.

04:19

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

So, my gosh. That that's that's stunning. So where do you bring in a bunch of these particular pieces? Like, this is amazing.

04:29

Chris Blackburn

So, you know, a lot of these I I shop. I'm you know, we I go to places that don't have things that I think would look good in their showroom, and Uh-huh. We make this a shopping experience. Yes, it's a lot of slabs, but we still have a lot of decor and a lot of it's mineral decor, but there's some just kinda weird art items.

04:47

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

So so someone can come buy this?

04:48

Chris Blackburn

Yes. Everything in the showroom is for sale.

04:51

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Okay. This is just amazing. Yeah. I cannot believe that I have not been here before.

04:57

Chris Blackburn

We I mean, I still think it's one of the best kept secrets. We love curating. I mean, it's just like we love finding cool stuff that people don't have. And, you know, there are mineral hounds. They love the art of mineral collecting, but

05:10

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Uh-huh.

05:10

Chris Blackburn

There are lot of people that are like, hey, just want that on a bookshelf because it looks fascinating.

05:14

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

That's right.

05:15

Chris Blackburn

You know, I've had if in my office, you know, big mineral specimens, it it helps decorate.

05:20

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

It really does. I have them in my office.

05:22

Chris Blackburn

Yeah. Oh. This is we call this coyote cowling at the moon. Is that crazy?

05:28

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh my gosh.

05:30

Chris Blackburn

And it this lady would not part with it. I thought, finally, you have to give me a price that you would sell this to me for because it's gonna go perfect in my showroom.

05:38

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh my goodness. This whole space. Yeah. I mean, this.

05:43

Chris Blackburn

Yeah. This artist is out of Aledo. Really? I ran into him and I was telling him my place, he's like, they all look at me like, oh yeah, you're on the Stone Biz. He's like, no, no, I am, but it's kinda different.

05:57

Chris Blackburn

Gosh. So he makes a lot of this really cool stuff, he hammers all this inside there. Yeah, Billy Schenck? Yes. That's one of his pieces.

06:04

Chris Blackburn

We went to his house.

06:06

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

You did?

06:06

Chris Blackburn

Yeah. My business partner went to his house in Santa Fe. Santa Fe. And know, he's a big fan of them. This is Kym Day.

06:16

Chris Blackburn

She's here in Dallas. She's a phenomenal

06:20

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

This is Day?

06:21

Chris Blackburn

Kym Day. She's a girl here in Dallas, and her detail on horses is not real.

06:25

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh, the work is incredible.

06:27

Chris Blackburn

But it is good Southwestern art, you know?

06:30

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh my gosh. Well, you don't understand. I have a whole ranch that I I need to also complete. And so this is wonderful. And then look at...

06:41

Chris Blackburn

This you can actually turn this into a waterfall. So the highest point is I think right here. And it will all cas if you put a hole right through here, it'll all cascade down. And people think, well, how do you move this thing? And I said, well, when they made it, they cut forklift jack rails in it. So you can run a forklift right underneath it and pick it up. Oh. I can go with this thing anywhere with a little bit of ease.

07:05

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Yeah, this is insane. And where do you find them?

07:10

Chris Blackburn

So the Perot Museum had their their exhibit that's going on right now, it's going on for a year, is called a Spectrum in Stone, the Topaz exhibit. We got to sponsor that exhibit for a whole year. When they asked me for that partnership, said yes. And through that, I got to meet the top mineral collectors in the world. One of them is right here in the Rockwall and she's the coolest lady in the world. Her name's Gail Spann. Gail and Jim Spann, and they're they're they're names on all a lot of the minerals up at the Perot. Well, they love me. So we get to go. They invite me to private digs.

07:51

Chris Blackburn

They invite me to to go do stuff. I'm meeting people that I'd I've always wanted to meet and just never knew how to meet. And she's like, Chris, we hang out with all these people. Oh my god. So and then she believes that this is a a true connection, the minerals and the stone, because the fossils up there, they're the same age as a lot of this same stuff.

08:10

Chris Blackburn

And most people, they don't when they put those two together, they're like, oh, this is this is not a new countertop. You know, this is this is this is old. This is as old as that fossil that's on the wall.

08:20

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

That's right.

08:20

Chris Blackburn

So it it makes you think differently about the stone, that's what me and Andrew we think it's an education, and it's also fun, and all this stuff comes from different places with a different story behind it.

08:30

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

That's right.

08:31

Chris Blackburn

So we know when we started this, we said we are gonna be a different stone company than what everybody knows. My goodness. The stone reps that travel the world that come to us, they said, Chris, top five in the nation. They said, not because you have such a luxurious because your vibe is so cool here.

08:47

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

It is. It is a vibe.

08:50

Chris Blackburn

So we're gonna walk quickly because I still got the other building I want you to show.

08:54

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Of course.

08:55

Chris Blackburn

Before we hit run out of time here. Did you see the bathrooms?

08:58

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

The bathrooms? No. Oh, I love this. You're right. It is an entire experience.

09:05

Chris Blackburn

And

09:08

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

are you the one who designs most of this?

09:10

Chris Blackburn

Yeah. I have to be people. I I don't talk myself. I I I just have a I have a I have a dream, I guess.

09:18

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh my goodness.

09:19

Chris Blackburn

This is all semi precious stone. Oh my god. Bismuth, tiger eye, quartz.

09:27

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Gosh. Is that intense? That is epic.

09:32

Chris Blackburn

So we're gonna walk across a little bit.

09:34

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Please, let's do it.

09:41

Chris Blackburn

And we like to entertain. We have some phenomenal functions here. Dwell the dinghy iron color party is a big one. Rocktoberfest, Rocktoberfest, I'll show you pictures in a minute. You'll blow your mind how we do Oh, gosh.

09:53

Chris Blackburn

I mean I can get 3,000 people and this property looks empty. But you can see there's just it's just stuff and we try to create environments that just make it fun to hang out in and get inspired because nobody does it and we still have so far. I mean, you know, we've been in here five years in this space and we still want to get this closed in and make it another really fun epic space. This is a this is a great one. Look how clear. There's parts on this you can literally see your hand on the backside of it.

10:23

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Oh, I'm sure. Oh, that's a beautiful one.

10:29

Chris Blackburn

Basalt columns. These are true basalt columns. They're not glued together. This is true basalt columns in the earth. And it's funny because a lot of times you see It's in Brazil.

10:40

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Brazil.

10:40

Chris Blackburn

Well, South America. Most of it comes from Brazil. But it's funny that most of the time you see this, it's turned this way so you see the linear. A of people kind of like this and I love this.

10:51

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Me too.

10:54

Chris Blackburn

Yeah, it's hard as nails.

10:56

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

It is?

10:57

Chris Blackburn

Oh, yeah. Basalt is hard as nails.

10:59

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Do people ever use this outdoors?

11:03

Chris Blackburn

It can be used outdoors.

11:04

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

It can be.

11:05

Chris Blackburn

For sure.

11:05

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Well, thank you so much for this tour. I know it goes on and on, and then you have

11:10

Chris Blackburn

There's so much stuff here.

11:11

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Yes. Mean, There's just

11:12

Chris Blackburn

There I have stuff on the back row that's just as expensive as what's in here because I can't it's it's For sure. Yeah. It's I can't merchandise it because it's too heavy.

11:20

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

No. I get that. I absolutely get it.

11:22

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Hello, everyone. My name is Sarah Subiate Bennett. I do not work directly in this wonderful industry, but I am cofounder of the Dallas Express and the host of Let's Talk Local. So this will actually be viewed by not just everyone in this room, but when we launch this on the show by thousands and thousands and thousands of different people. So I'm so excited to be here. My husband has hospitality industry, runs three publicly traded companies, all of which own hotels, hundreds of hotels, and everything within it. We have Premier Design to Completion, which is part of the Ashford/Remington group of companies. And so this is very much part of my everyday life. I design a lot of my own homes and spaces, and I know a lot of the viewers and listeners of the show will gain a lot of insight as to what takes shape in this remarkable industry. It is a tough one. It is a cool one. And I feel like most people who work in this respected industry just have a lot of wisdom to share. So I'm eager to learn from each of these wonderful people here today. And I have not met any of you except for just earlier today, but I'm excited to get to know you and hear your wisdom and to share it with a lot of people. And now if we can pivot over to AI and all of these tools that are now readily available within your space, even the client space. So I'm sure that's changed a lot of conversations that you're having. But the question specifically, how are you leveraging AI or other emerging technologies in your work? And where do you see the biggest opportunities for innovation in design?

13:19

April Henegar

I think there's this connotation that AI is scary for a lot of people that I know. And I think that it there's a fear of it taking over the design industry or or or other jobs, and there there is in some situations. But I feel like in our field, what our clients hire us for is for the design expertise, emotional intelligence when we're interacting with them, the reading them and figuring out what what really ticks in their hearts and what really is important to them. And you can't get that from an AI bot. One example that really sticks in my mind is just using the lidar to just scan a room. That saves so much time and you get it in a CAD or DWG or whatever file you want to do and it takes twenty minutes, you scan the room and all of a sudden you have a three d in the computer versus very accurate. So I think that would be like when I was trying to think of the most amazing AI like tool, like you hire somebody to do that and they spend like three hours measuring and then then you're like did I really trust that junior to do that? Like did they do it right? I need to go back and check. There are ways of using those tools, but that's not a creativity's tool.

14:44

April Henegar

You're not you're not picking up furniture. You're not picking up color with it. You're using the tools to save you time so that you can do the creative part that your client really hires you to do. Because your responsibility is to put the client's story in their home.

15:00

David Call

Truly, AI for us has been a game changer. I've been doing product development for the past three years, and to have AI as part of that influence, to have the business acumen of, just like Deborah was mentioning about, I've gotten to a point in my career, I don't want to work. I want to do what I love. And so this just simply comes with age and with the age of your business also. So that is truly where it has been a game changer for us, from helping us to design packaging, to helping us tweak and redesign furniture pieces that we're putting in the line or whatever we might be doing, they engage AI. And it absolutely has been a game changer for us.

15:54

Sarah Zubiate Bennett

Thank so much, David. I didn't hear anyone here talk about something in particular that I found to be fascinating that our, my architect uses. And her name is Purva Jain, and she uses, some software that allows people, let's say like my husband, who cannot for the life of him, he can't imagine what this will look like against this. Just can't do it. So she has some software, this system that inputs the entire room into a virtual reality space using the Oculus. And so he's able to walk through and say, no, no, no, no, we need to, Sarah, this is not working in this So it takes longer, but do you all find yourselves working with more architects or places that utilize this?

16:47

April Henegar

My CAD guy, he who who have I hired, he does, like, three d walk throughs. With renderings today? Renderings. I think that's, like, the step right to the next, like the VR. Right? And I think you're talking about VR. Yes. I think that when you have a bigger firm, then possibly you can do more technology. But I really think that probably in the next year is gonna change. I feel like the technology has grown so much. And and my cad guy has said, I can do this. I can do this for you. And I'm like, okay. Well, when I have the client that wants it, currently, I use more of the 3D or the walk through version in in CAD.

17:29

Nicole Arnold

Seamless as it is today to all of us to take CAD and put it in the SketchUp and see that 3D rendering. Chief Architect will do the same thing. Anybody uses that tool. How much more seamless is it going to be this in a year or so? Because I bet you there's going to be an import from that to the Oculus. It's Awesome. It wouldn't surprise me at that much.

17:51

Debra Stewart

Well, now I'm doing the full size to scale floor plans that people can stand in the middle of the room and get a feel for it, but it's not three-dimensional.

18:00

Nicole Arnold

Yeah. Right. No problem.

18:01

Debra Stewart

But clients love it. Mhmm. Do love it. The 3D version is called their room when it's installed.