Located in a big red barn on Henkel Square, Humble Donkey Studio is an art gallery and antiques shop owned by John and Laurie Lowery.
“It’s a happy place,” Laurie says. “What people respond to is the bright colors. There’s a lightness, a sense of humor.” “We don’t take things too seriously,” John adds. “This is for fun. It was a whim of an idea, really,” John says, about opening the gallery four years ago. “It went from a hobby to this full-time business.”
Former Houston residents, John and Laurie, moved to Round Top in 2014. Before making the move, Round Top was their escape from the big city.
“We used to be weekenders. Our social life was created with so many other weekenders. We have made such great friendships here,” John says. “We came from living in the heart of Houston, now our ‘city life’ is in Round Top. We live in Burton [between Round Top and Brenham] on 60 acres. On 60 acres, you don’t see another house, another soul.”
What John does see is inspiration all around. John has always been an artist. He got his start, right out of high school, as an illustrator for NASA, then went into advertising as an art director before starting his own Houston-based agency, Design At Work, in 1990.
“When we would go back to Houston, after weekends in Round Top, I wanted to paint what we saw. It took me back to that place.”
Now full-time residents, John still owns the ad agency but has stepped away from the day-to-day operations to paint.
“I paint constantly,” John says. “I do commissions, especially when people ask nicely, but it kind of reminds me of painting for money. When I painted for money, it was a job, to please my client. Now, creating an original piece of art comes from a desire to create. At the end of the day, I paint things I love to paint. It’s not so much doing a painting people will love; I’ll do a painting I want to do and hope someone loves it. There is a certain truth to art like that. An honesty. It’s like you know you can like someone when they are being genuine.”
“I want every piece to be different and unique. I am not going to paint a horse a hundred times. Each piece is different. Each piece has a different name. Sometimes I am into flowers. Sometimes I am into animals. Sometimes my stuff is realistic, sometimes it’s weird. It keeps me excited as an artist.”
Laurie adds, “At the beginning, his work was very pastoral, now it’s almost fantastical things, not in reality, the more out there he becomes, the more interested people are. The more unique he is, the more response we get. It’s been fun to watch him evolve, and take risks.”
Inside Humble Donkey Studio is Lower40, for which Laurie sources antiques.
“I’ve always been a collector,” Laurie says. “I never say I’m an antiques expert. I know what I like, and it’s worked out that way. I am more into Americana. I love mid-century and would love to see that grow in our business, but I love a little bit of everything, as long as it’s authentic, well made.”
John adds, “We’re not going to buy things we don’t love. There’s no phoniness to what we do.” “Someone told me once,” Laurie says, “‘Buy what you love, you’ll never regret what you buy.’ And that’s what we do. We are open year-round. We opened at a time when there weren’t any year-round antiques stores. Now that Paul Michael is here, it’s helped make Round Top a year-round destination.”
John is also the director of the Chamber of Commerce for Round Top and has seen the town grow in just a short time.
“It really is amazing how in such a short period of time, we have not only grown but adapted. In order to be open year-round, we needed to have shopping, dining and lodging. What I like about it is that even though we’ve added things, we’ve still maintained the DNA of being a creative small town. In a town so teeny tiny, a town of our size, you don’t see that much to see and do. I call it ‘big time small.’”
As more people find Round Top, they continue to discover Humble Donkey.
“We have such a fun time meeting people,” John says. “We want to be approachable. We want art to be accessible to all. We sell originals but also high-end reproductions. Anyone can own a print, and it can be customized, determined by size, so it allows people to do it the way they want to do it,” he says. “I want to have art on my walls that makes me smile. And I want people to buy my art, because it brings a smile to them.”
Humble Donkey Studio is open year-round, Wednesday through Sunday on Henkel Square. During the fall show, it is open every day with extended hours. John and Laurie invite everyone to stop by and enjoy a cold beer or glass of wine and feel like a VID, Very Important Donkey. Stay tuned for shop news and updates by following Humble Donkey on Facebook.com/HumbleDonkeyStudio and Instagram @humbledonkeystudio.