Ski Dream Home - Luxury Mountain Retreat, Utah

Photo Courtesy of Resorts West Ski Dream Home

Location and contact info

"Nestled atop Little Baldy Peak in the exclusive, private gated community of Deer Crest, the Resorts West Ski Dream Home offers 14,000 square feet of indoor living space. The home features six bedrooms, 10 baths, a gourmet kitchen with separate butler's pantry, a home theater with stadium seating for 16, freshwater trout aquarium, pool table, DJ booth, 2 custom bar areas and Full Swing Golf simulator. Outside, enjoy stunning panoramic views, outdoor fireplaces, heated wrap-around decks, a heated outdoor pool plus oversized hot tub and slope-side ski-in/ski-out access via a private heated ski bridge."

Contemporary Glass House by Nico Van Der Meulen Architects, Johannesburg, South Africa

“The house is situated on a 4000 sq.m site, with a total floor area of 2500sq.m. The owner requested a modern, glamorous, open plan, light-filled house with views from all rooms into the garden.

The shape on the south side is a half circle, forming a horseshoe on the north side. Approaching the house form the gate the driveway is elevated to allow glimpses thru’ the house to the garden and raised water feature on the other side of the house.”

Architecture: Nico Van Der Meulen Architects
Photography: Barry Goldman, David Ross

Luxury 5 Star Chalet - Boutique Hotel in Swiss Alps

Situated in one of the world's most desirable locations, Chalet Zermatt Peak is a luxury 5 star chalet / boutique hotel. With uninterrupted views to the iconic Matterhorn and over the village of Zermatt, it is the premier Chalet in the Alps.

Exceptional Luxury

Chalet Zermatt Peak is a landmark chalet in one of the most desirable locations in the world. Set into the side of the mountain, it offers unrivalled panoramic views across the village and to the Matterhorn. No expense has been spared in creating Zermatt's ultimate and most luxurious chalet.

An Exclusive Location

The iconic Matterhorn towers over the picturesque village of Zermatt, which remains one of the leading ski destinations in the world. The appeal of Zermatt lies in the array of exhilarating sport and mountain activities on offer, coupled with the quality of amenities available in the village. Zermatt is as much about rest, relaxation and good times as it is about breathtaking ski runs and snowboarding.

Individual Design

Floor to ceiling windows maximise the views over the village and mountains. Internally, the chalet offers five bedrooms all with en-suite showers / bathrooms and dressing areas, luxury open-plan living and dining areas and a fabulous wellness, boasting a stunning indoor / outdoor jacuzzi, gym, sauna and steam room. There is also an external cooking and dining area, ski room and walk-in wine cellar.

Private tunnel access with electronic security doors and video entry security system, Ski room with feature storage and a walk-in wine cellar with floor to ceiling glass walls.

Main Entrance

• Entrance area and ski room with ambiance lighting, digital surround sound TV, feature storage and heated boot warmers

• Walk-in wine cellar with floor to ceiling glass wall and an extensive collection of fine wines and champagne

• Open plan designer finish with natural, locally sourced Zermatt stone flooring and bamboo feature wall combined with silver birch features

• Designer hand carved Matterhorn waterfall feature

• Nussbaum (walnut) floating wood staircase with designer glass, steel and quartz crystal central column

• Lift with granite stone flooring, wood and mirror clad panelling which provides access to all levels

• Spiral wood and stainless steel staircase to gallery bedroom

Bedrooms

• 5 bedrooms, all with en-suite designer bathrooms

• Nussbaum (walnut) solid wood flooring, Brazilian stone, Italian marble and porcelain flooring

• Digital surround-sound for TV and music

• Seating and dressing areas with high speed wireless internet

• Each bedroom has either a private terrace or balcony with designer seating and bio-fire coffee tables

• Gallery bedroom with glass roof, offering panoramic views of the surrounding mountains, and stars by night

Bathrooms

• En-suite shower rooms and toilets

• Designer bathrobes and luxury linen

• Porcelain floors throughout

• Designer chrome fittings with thermostatically controlled showers

• Chrome, heated towel radiators

• Private Jacuzzi in master bedroom

• Heated mirrors, shaving points and in-built hairdryers

Dining Areas

• Designer feature chrome, glass and nussbaum (walnut) extensive dining table with seating for twelve people

• Sculptured leather and chrome dining chairs

• Feature display side unit with integrated bar

• Extensive handmade Murano crystal chandelier over dining area

• Tree stem champagne buckets

Kitchens

• Spacious, fully fitted luxury kitchen with an extensive range of Gaggenau and Miele appliances

• Designer integrated, glass panelled feature lighting

• Nussbaum (walnut) solid wood features and flooring, Brazilian stone and Italian marble throughout

• Open plan kitchen with integrated feature breakfast bar

• A second outdoor, all weather kitchen for year round al-fresco dining can be found on the external terrace

Living Rooms

• Nussbaum (walnut) solid wood flooring, Brazilian stone and Italian marble

• Digital surround sound for TV / video and music

• Double-height exposed timber ceiling

• Office / Library / Study area with TV computer, Wii and extensive book and DVD library

• Ergonomic De Sede moving sofa to take advantage of all aspects of living area

• Designer feature coffee table with bio-fire and open natural log fireplace

• Extensive balcony and terrace with unrivaled panoramic views over the village of Zermatt and to the Matterhorn

• Ambient lighting design incorporating handmade murano crystal light fittings and floor lighting alongside feature candles

Wellness

• Bespoke internal / external jacuzzi

• Bio steam room with healing crystal and quartz clad walls

• Dry Finnish and wet Swedish sauna options, with horizontal larch timbers

• Fully fitted outdoor entertainment area with al-fresco dining facilities

• Sliding doors expanding the wellness and terrace area

• ESPA products used throughout wellness

• Bose indoor / outdoor surround sound music system

• Self contained kitchen area with Nespresso coffee making facilities and water supplied daily

• Relaxation area with designer chaise-longue seating

• Italian Nero Assoluto granite flooring, black polished spandeck ceiling, beige Italian Gialo natural modular stone work walls

• Designer stone and stainless steel water feature

Wildcat Ranch in Snowmass Village, Colorado

Situated on 500 private acres in Snowmass Village, Colorado, this spectacular Wildcat Ranch is a compound that includes a main house, barn, guest house, ponds, pastures, breathtaking views and heavenly outdoor spaces. The incredibly designed main house features over 23,000 square feet on 3 levels with 4 bedrooms, 6 baths, 6 half baths, modern kitchen, formal and informal living rooms, glorious her and his master baths and closets, massage room, large exercise room, indoor spa with sunken hot tub, game room, multiple offices, wet bar, three-tiered theater, hardwood floors, vaulted ceilings, beautiful outdoor spaces with wood-burning fireplace and fire pit, and a 6 car garage totaling 2,532 square feet.

Photography: Sotheby's

Modern Beautiful Home with Reflecting Ponds, California

About Horst Architects




Architecture Horst Architects
Project THE STRAND
Location California, United States
Photography John Ellis

This AIA award winning home resides at the Strand in Dana Point, California. A series of overlapping reflecting ponds within the home’s central courtyard instills a sense of meditation and retreat where one can contemplate the sky and ocean. Outdoor and indoor living is orchestrated by balancing views with privacy, communal space with intimacy. The clear expression of the steel skeleton structure, infilled with wood and glass, allows the structure to sit lightly along the coastal terrain, while limestone walls anchor the structure.

Description from architects:

Several generations of the owner’s family enjoyed seaside vacations in their weathered, wooden cottage in Crystal Cove, just north of Laguna Beach, California. When the lease with the State of California recently expired, the owners purchased a property within the Strand at the Headlands, a few miles south in Dana Point. Seeking to re-establish their familial base, the owners requested a relaxed family beach house accommodating three master suites for parents and grandparents, as well as a suitable environment for children, grandchildren and friends. The parti reflects the program through a composition of three diaphanous pavilions around a central, unifying courtyard. This courtyard is concealed from the street and entered discretely through a pivoting wood door revealing a covered passageway along a stone wall leading to the entry. This sequence of movement from street to inner sanctum creates an atmosphere of mystery and heightens the sense of arrival, while also revealing the ocean view sequentially. A series of overlapping reflecting ponds contained within the central courtyard instill a sense of meditation and retreat where one can contemplate the ocean and sky.

Beautiful Luxury Mansion in Laguna Beach, California

Fantastic home in Laguna Beach

Location




Bedrooms 5
Bathrooms 6.5 baths
Area 5850 sq. ft.
Year Built: 2002
Location Laguna Beach, California

This beautiful luxury mansion in California set right on the front row of a beach and greets us with an elegant luxury design and breathtaking views of the Pacific Ocean. Spreading over 5,750 square feet, the mansion features five bedrooms, seven baths, expansive outdoor terraces, swimming pool and a spa overlooking the Laguna Beach coast.

Description from real estate agent.

Showcasing one of Emerald Bay's finest front-row locations, this exquisite estate blends Old World elegance with contemporary flair in a grand residence that maximizes panoramic ocean views from almost every room. The impeccable seaside sanctuary rivals 5-star resort living, promising its fortunate residents a rare lifestyle complimented by a setting just above a beautiful private beach.

Reflecting unparalleled craftsmanship and attention to detail, the residence encompasses nearly 5850 square feet of exquisitely appointed living space, with floor-to-ceiling windows, elegantly crafted stone flooring, voluminous ceiling heights, romantic archways and elegant wrought-iron staircases.

Appreciated refinements are led by an enormous home theatre for film connoisseurs, state-of-the-art audio and lighting systems, a gourmet kitchen with Viking and Wolf appliances, temperature-controlled wine room with storage for up to 700 bottles, 5 bedrooms, 6.5 baths, a game room or formal dining room with an artisan-crafted arched stone ceiling, exercise room and a private ocean-front black-bottom swimming pool and spa overlooking Emerald Bay's private beach.




Majestically situated on the bluff, the estate presents an elevator, 4-car garage, expansive homesite of approximately 14000 square feet, and a balcony, loggia or patio off most rooms for the ultimate in luxury living.

Frank Gehry's beautiful architecture - Schnabel House, Brentwood, Los Angeles, California

Project: Schnabel House
Architecture: Frank Gehry
Bedrooms: 5
Bathrooms: 5
Area: 5700 sq ft
Year: 1989
Location: Brentwood, Los Angeles, California
Photography: Nick Springett, LATimes




Built in 1989, Frank Gehry's Schnabel House in Brentwood (Los Angeles) has been called many things: free-form architecture, career watershed, family home, status symbol, sculpture. The house has five bedrooms and five bathrooms and has been described as "a village that looks inward". The half-acre of grounds include a swimming pool, a reflecting pond and an olive orchard. There is a main house, a guesthouse, an office and a garage-and-gym building with a breezeway.


Description from Architectural Digest, 2014

Schnabel House, one of the last single-family dwellings designed by Frank Gehry, is on the market, and it just got yet another price reduction. Called one of the greatest houses of the 20th century, the 5,700-square-foot home in L.A.’s Brentwood neighborhood was built in 1989 for Rockwell Schnabel, a former ambassador to Finland, and his wife, Marna, an architect.

The six-bedroom, five-bathroom residence was last sold by Broadway producer Jon B. Platt in January 2013, after he spent years restoring the home under Gehry’s guidance. Producer Michael LaFetra purchased the house from Platt, and since then it has been on and off the market with a series of price changes. LaFetra first listed the house in June 2014 for $14.995 million, then took it off the market a few weeks later. He relisted the property for $12.995 million last September and has reduced it three more times before arriving at the current $10.495 million asking price.

The property includes a main house, a guesthouse, a sauna, a garage and gym building, and an office with a dome inspired by the Griffith Observatory. The grounds feature a reflecting pond, a swimming pool, and an olive orchard.




“This is the design I had fantasized about for my own house,” Gehry has said of Schnabel House.

Piano and violin house, China

This piano and violin house is located in the An Hui province of China. The piano shaped building contains city plans to showcase future growth of the region and the violin contains an escalator.

Design: Huainan Fangkai Decoration Project Co.

Cliff house on Mediterranean sea, Alicante, Spain

The living spaces of the Cliff house on Mediterranean sea are spread over four floors to reduce to a minimum adjustments to the topography. The white lime walls stucco recalls the traditional Mediterranean architecture of the area. A swimming pool terrace set on the lowest level and opens to the dramatic sea view. Leading up from the swimming pool, an outdoor stair is attached to the concrete monolithic exterior allowing residents to change levels in different surrounding sceneries. The living room, bedrooms, kitchen and dining are situated at the top level of the house.

Architecture: Fran Silvestre Arquitectos
Photography: Diego Opazo

Transparent Glass House Concept

About Santambrogiomilano

The transparent glass house concept allow inhabitants to be completely immersed in surrounding nature. Every building's detail is composed of structural glass pieces, except for the ground floor. With the touch of a button, the glass panels instantly change transparency for privacy, and hidden sliding curtains allow visually close individual rooms.




Description from architects

Simplicity is when, in the act of creating the dwelling, matter becomes transparent, a medium for aesthetic values, the stage and theater of representation. Carlo Santambrogio and Ennio Arosio pursue and achieve their design intention in which glass figures as the unquestioned protagonist, excluding the mediation of supports that would challenge its leading role. “That image is symbolic,” they comment. “We’re portrayed standing on a transparent sheet of glass. We’re on the upper floor of the Milan showroom, in reality absorbed into a dimension which effaces every distinction between spaces and relates the interior to the setting outside, the urban context. So often, at least virtually, the boundary line vanishes, and we receive the impression of an unbroken vision.

It is then that we ask ourselves about the applications most relevant to the project. And we realize everything is possible in Simplicity, everything can be achieved, provided it embodies a sensitive interpretation of the basic function aimed at satisfying aesthetic needs. The Plexiglas joint makes it possible to combine and assemble the sheets of glass, defining architectural works which are one the development of the other and are integrated in and adapted to the most disparate settings.” “The outside world, nature, landscape, penetrate, thanks to glass and its abstractness, into the intimate or private realm inside, and there play, freely as a component of the atmosphere.” Hence the dream, notes Jean Baudrillard, of living “in a garden in close intimacy with nature, experiencing the charm of every season.” In the words of Wim Wenders, “most of the buildings that are built in big cities are not the fruit of a dream… All you see are huge concrete blocks, tasteless blocks.” And Italo Calvino: “The invisible cities are a dream born from the heart of unlivable cities.” Stupid, obsolete fortresses, those blocks of concrete constitute much of the world’s metropolises and megalopolises. Even though “in various efforts to run counter to its own founding act,” in the words of Gianfranco Maraniello, “contemporary architecture has gone so far as to propose the negation of the ‘wall’ itself, both by creating ‘open’ and sometimes unlivable spaces and by modifying or creating living spaces without circumscribing them as certain defined rooms, or by making the boundaries of its constructs uncertain.” This is confirmed by Jean Baudrillard: “Glass is the miracle of a fixed fluid, of a content that is also a container, and hence the basis of the transparency between the two: a kind of transcendence which, as we have seen, is the first imperative in the creation of atmosphere… Indestructible, immune to decay, colorless, odorless… glass… is to matter as vacuum is to air… Glass is the basis of a transparency without transition: we see, but cannot touch. The message is universal and abstract.” Carlo Santambrogio observes: “On brownfield sites, row up row of factories in serried ranks testify to now remote times, when manufacturing was still carried on in urban districts. Today obsolete factories can be divided into apartments, known as ‘lofts.’ Real-estate dealers promote them as open spaces which, after undergoing the usual restructuring, will substantially change their nature and be organized as condominiums. This is because it is impossible to understand a single building regardless of its context. Open space cannot therefore be bounded by walls. Those walls testify to a history that is unchangeable: they are a landscape and form a frame of reference, which has to be respected and enhanced. Finding myself having to deal with one of these factory buildings, I immediately thought I could not turn it into a home of a traditional kind, or appeal to other illusory connotations. I would have to detach myself from those walls, leaving them open to the sky, and seek to create a dialogue with their history, even if I had to reinvent it. The idea could hardly help being related to transparency, the fascination of the material par excellence. Hence the garden with plants and flowers. Glass reflects and integrates the colors of the roses, jasmine and oleanders, of the sky and the clouds chasing each other across the blue; it distinguishes the light of dawn from that of sunset. All this in the city, the privilege of incommensurable moments amid those rows of factory buildings on a brownfield site. Glass endows a form on the load-bearing girders, floors, roof and walls. The staircase shines with the greenery of plants. Sunlight passes through the slabs that form the great pool. Colorless, the supreme material justifies the conception of the whole habitat, of the structure — the container — and of the furnishings — the content. Macro and micro are integrated in harmonious cohesion.

The composition of the kitchen space is exemplary. Seemingly immaterial, a landscape within the landscape, it reflects the glow of flame, the green of the vegetable garden, the pink of crustaceans, the red of meat. The interplay of transparencies heightens the senses, revealing food, when there is an occasion for it, a gratifying embodiment of desire, the achievement of the most exclusive life style.”

“No house,” wrote Frank Lloyd Wright, “should ever be on a hill or on anything. It should be of the hill. Belonging to it. Hill and house should live together each the happier for the other.” It has to belong to the where in everywhere. So, if the house is in the wood, the wood is in the house. This is not playing on words, but a confirmation of the relationship between two representations, one natural the other artificial. “Remember,” said Ludwig Wittgenstein, “the impression made by good architecture, which is to express a thought. You feel the urge to accompany it with a gesture.” The gesture of building is an extremely musical gesture. Good architecture is good music.

Carlo Santambrogio recounts: “Living in the forest day and night, in sun and rain, in wind, ice and snow, realizing the dream of making the forest the house so as to live in the forest. A house that must never be an object that can just be set down anywhere, but rather a place of enchantment, of wonder, of amazement. Three floors of vertical development, for the sake of all-round vision.




Going up the transparent stairs makes you feel you are climbing into the tree tops. In the house, where the forest is at home, in the shower cubicle the water patters on the skin like the drumming of rain in spring, the dormeuse is shaded from the warm summer sun, the scent of autumn is in the mushrooms on the table, winter in the sudden darkness that surprises the day.” Nature is onstage in the theater of transparencies, where snow, ice, rain and sun alternate in the limelight. Whoever lives here, enlivens the scene, lives by it and feels the excitement. His behavior is more like that of an actor than a member of the audience. Another house is that of the sea, where, in the words of Rudyard Kipling, we “comprehend and enjoy the dry chorus of wave-tops turning over with a sound of incessant tearing; the hurry of the winds working across open spaces and herding the purple-blue cloud-shadows; the splendid upheaval of the red sunrise.” And again Carlo Santambrogio: “The house of the sea lies along the promontory without clinging to it: it appears as if suspended. The whole structure reflects the rugged terrain. Under the slabs of the floor there plays a wind that bears the tang of sea salt and carries the cries of the gulls. The rock has a sense of sturdiness, of safety. And making landfall here is the first frame of reference in the setting, while the sea is a boundless vision. Whoever dwells in the house of the sea rests in port and dreams of setting sail again. Both transparent, a great bed stands out next to a bookcase, where even the books tell of the sea.”

Because, says Kipling again, “The dullest of folk cannot see this kind of thing hour after hour through long days without noticing it.”

Loft apartment in Manhattan, NYC

The design of the loft apartment in Manhattan, NYC mediates between living space and art gallery. The existing loft was characterized by demanding proportions: the space is wide and long, but also rather low. Curved walls were introduced to divide the main area into proportionally balanced zones. This generated spaces of comfortable proportions for living, while simultaneously creating a large amount of area for the display of art.

Design: UNStudio
Photography: Iwan Baan

Contemporary Cantilever House in Lithuania

Built in 2006, this cantilever house is located in the beautiful countryside of western Lithuania. Parking space is selected under the cantilever, which includes a large part of the house.

The client is a businessman in the agricultural manufacture sector (pigs rearing, chicken eggs). His wife learns design at the art college and a furniture design is a subject of her interest. A three member family cantilever house was built on the slope of Minija valley. The idea for the design was a shape of a huge fireplace logs or an image of Noah‘s ship for the family and all their animals and belongings, for moving from the city.

Architecture G.Natkevicius and partners
Project UTRIAI
Area 424 sqm
Year 2006
Location Vezaiciai, Lithuania

Beautiful House on Azores, Portugal

The clients asked for a home in which they could enjoy the outdoors year around and still be comfortable. Keeping their request in mind, the architect created protected patios and courtyards that are filled with indirect light during the day and offer shelter from the weather, which can be especially severe on this side of the island.

There are private rooms on the upper-floor, that are more protected and enclosed. The architectural typology follows and adheres an almost classical Scamozzi and Palladian central plan design, with two lateral wings enclosing one area for the kitchen and double height space on living room.

Architecture Bernardo Rodrigues Arquitecto
Project Flight of Birds
Location Ribeira Grande, Portugal
Year 2010
Photography Iwan Baan