Houston, TX · Right Angle Home & Outdoors
Omar Afra
Co-Founder & Principal — Client Engagement, Project Development & Design Strategy
Omar Afra co-founded Right Angle Home & Outdoors with Pedro Salazar. He came to residential construction by way of restoration work on century-old Houston buildings — including years on Fitzgerald's, the old wood dance hall turned music venue in the Heights — and years of building temporary infrastructure and logistics for large public events. Both left the same mark on how he works: solve water first, and sequence the job so nothing finished gets reopened. At Right Angle he handles client engagement, project development, scope and design strategy, and problem-solving in coordination with construction operations.
Areas of Expertise
Drainage & Permeable Systems
Permeable paver systems, French drains, and grading for Houston clay soil and flood-prone lots.
Restoration & Existing Conditions
Working on and around century-old Houston structures: rot, movement, ventilation, and honest demolition estimating.
Material Selection
Ipe, Garapa, Massaranduba, thermally modified wood, cedar, and composite specified for Houston heat, humidity, and heavy rain.
Sequencing & Permitting
Project scheduling shaped by event-infrastructure logistics, plus Houston permits and Heights historic review.
Construction & Project Development Background
Omar grew up around building — his father an engineer, his uncle an architect — and was working on buildings well before Right Angle existed. Right Angle is the permanent version of that work.
Before construction
Engineering and architecture at the dinner table
Omar grew up around engineering and architecture — the family trade a generation before Right Angle existed. Drawings, load paths, and the idea that a building is a system rather than a surface were normal household vocabulary long before they were a job.
Restoration
Fitzgerald's — a century-old Houston venue
Restoration and buildout work on Fitzgerald's, a roughly century-old Houston building operated as a music venue. Older buildings make prior work visible, and that is where the habit of dealing with water, ventilation, and structure before finishes came from.
Read the full accountPublishing & cultural work
Free Press Houston, Free Press Summer Fest, Day for Night
Founder, publisher and editor of Free Press Houston, and co-founder and producer of Houston cultural events including Free Press Summer Fest and Day for Night. That work is now collected in the Free Press Houston archive (2003–2018), preserving recovered writing, artwork, back issues and festival history.
Live events
Festival infrastructure and logistics
Building temporary infrastructure for large public events — stages and structures, power and water runs, fencing and crowd paths, load-in and load-out on a hard, published deadline. Fixed dates and open weather teach sequencing, staging, and honest scheduling faster than anything else in construction.
Read the full accountResidential & commercial
Heights and inner-loop outdoor construction
Applying both to permanent work: decks, pergolas and covers, permeable paver patios and drives, pool decks, cedar fencing, drainage and retaining walls across the Heights, Woodland Heights, Montrose, River Oaks, West University, and Memorial.
Now
Co-founder & principal, Right Angle Home & Outdoors
With co-founder Pedro Salazar, Omar runs Right Angle as a design-build firm: one team owning the drawing, the permit, the schedule, and the crew. He leads design and client engagement; Pedro runs construction operations.
About the firm
About Omar Afra
Omar's construction work began well before Right Angle, on existing buildings rather than new ones. Restoration and buildout work at Fitzgerald's — a roughly century-old Houston building run as a music venue — meant working around decades of prior alterations, where moisture, ventilation, and structure had to be understood before any finish work made sense.
The second half of that education came from live events, where he built temporary infrastructure and ran logistics on a published deadline: stages and structures, power and water, fencing and crowd paths, load-in and load-out. Event work removes the ability to hide an unfinished detail, which makes sequencing and honest scheduling non-negotiable habits rather than good intentions.
Behind both is a family background in engineering and architecture that predates Right Angle — the reason drawings, load paths, and detailing were never treated as optional overhead here.
At Right Angle he leads design and client engagement while co-founder Pedro Salazar runs construction operations. Much of the work is in the Heights, Woodland Heights, Montrose, River Oaks, West University, and Memorial: decks in Ipe and Garapa, cedar pergolas and covers, permeable paver patios and drives, pool decks, cedar fencing, and the drainage and retaining wall work that has to happen underneath all of it.
Right Angle has been named a Nextdoor Neighborhood Favorite in 2024 and 2025. More on the firm is on the about page.
Before and alongside construction, Omar Afra was the founder, publisher and editor of Free Press Houston, and co-founded and produced Houston cultural events including Free Press Summer Fest and Day for Night. That period is now collected in his record in the Free Press Houston archive (2003–2018), which preserves recovered writing, artwork, back issues and festival history from the paper's run.
Recognition & Credentials
- Nextdoor Neighborhood Favorite 2024 & 2025 (Right Angle Home & Outdoors)
- Restoration and buildout work on Fitzgerald's, a century-old Heights venue
- Festival and event infrastructure, structures and logistics
- Houston, TX — inner-loop and west Houston projects
- Author — 2026 Houston Outdoor Living Report and Right Angle essays
Selected Houston & Heights work
Selected completed Right Angle projects
Photographs of our own completed work. Where the record names a neighborhood, it is named; where it does not, it says Houston-area.
Houston Heights · Travertine · cedar · brick
Pool surround, cedar privacy fence, brick counter and pergola built as one system so the water, the hardscape and the shade structure share a single set of finished elevations.
Houston-area · Brazilian hardwood
A low hardwood platform framed around a mature live oak, held off the pool coping so the deck can be lifted for service without cutting anything.
West University, Houston · Clay brick pavers
A narrow side drive in clay brick — herringbone field, soldier-course border, gravel edge strip taking the runoff instead of the neighbor.
West University, Houston · Hardwood · steel · cable rail
A raised front deck with a horizontal skirt and stainless cable rail — the skirt is screwed, not glued, so the underside stays reachable.
Houston-area · Concrete pavers
A tumbled grey paver field on an open-graded base — the joint pattern is doing structural work, not decoration.
Memorial, Houston · Artificial turf · drainage
Turf over a permeable base with a flush drain inlet — the fix for a shaded Houston yard where grass had already been replanted twice.
At Right Angle
What the role actually is
Omar co-founded Right Angle Home & Outdoors with Pedro Salazar and works the front half of every job: the first walk of the property, where water goes, what the scope really includes, which materials suit the exposure, and the order the work has to happen in. Pedro runs construction operations and holds the built result to the drawing.
Most of that work is inner-loop Houston — the Heights and Greater Heights, West University, Memorial and River Oaks — on lots where access is tight, the soil moves seasonally, and the difference between a good project and a callback is decided underground.
Field Notes & Guides
What Restoring a Century-Old Houston Music Venue Taught Me About Construction
What Festival Infrastructure Taught Me About Construction Project Management
Building Outdoor Living in the Houston Heights: What to Plan Before Construction
Houston Heights Backyard Drainage: Clay Soil, Pavers, Decks and Where the Water Goes
Choosing Deck and Pergola Materials for Houston Heights Heat, Humidity and Shade
Katy Deck Rebuild in Trex Saddle Brown — Project Case Study
Houston Outdoor Materials Decision Matrix
Houston Outdoor Project Planning & Build Sequence
2026 Houston Outdoor Living & Eco-Friendly Backyard Transformation Report
Interview: Omar Afra & Pedro Salazar on Houston Outdoor Installations
Permeable Pavers in Houston — Pavestone & Belgard Systems
Drainage & Retaining Walls — Memorial & Buffalo Bayou
Right Angle Co-Founder
Pedro Salazar
Pedro Salazar leads construction operations at Right Angle, translating Omar's drainage-first designs into finished projects. He is the reason the built result matches the drawing.
View Pedro's profileHouston, TX
Start a Project with Omar Afra & Right Angle
Call or text 713-496-2669 to discuss your outdoor living project in Heights, River Oaks, West University, Memorial, Montrose, or anywhere in Houston, TX.