In winter, when most of the country is yearning for warmer weather, Arizona is the rare domestic respite that all but guarantees a bright, arid climate year-round. Snowbirds drawn in from the East Coast and Midwest by the city’s sunny disposition seek the comfort of a lock-and-leave second home.
On the other end of the buyer spectrum are local residents who want to retain their footprint in town, yet are eager to pass on the maintenance, landscaping, and cooling bills of a large house during scorching summer heat. The Residences and Villas at Mountain Shadows offers a solution for both.
Flanked by an iconic hotel and Phoenix’s landmark Camelback Mountain, the Residences—designed and built by New Home Co. in collaboration with project architects JZMK Partners—exude desert glamour in a resort enclave aptly dubbed Paradise Valley. The 10.5-acre residential community is adjacent to the site of the Mountain Shadows Resort, a former playground for 1950s Hollywood elite including Elizabeth Taylor, John Wayne, and Burt Reynolds, that underwent a full renovation in 2016.
“Our design approach is always led by the natural surroundings of the site, and in this instance, Camelback Mountain was our inspiration,” says chief marketing officer Joan Marcus Webb, who serves as an integral part of the company’s internal design team alongside co-founder and chief investment officer Tom Redwitz. “We thought a softened approach to a ‘desert contemporary’ style would bring the right mix of sophistication and design to the community.”
The development, which offers 14 detached homes in addition to 52 four-plex villas, marks the company’s first foray into the Phoenix market and was designed with “right-sizing” buyers in mind. The single-family homes range from 3,049 to 3,915 square feet with three to four bedrooms and up to four and one-half baths. For those looking for a more compact dwelling, the villas are sized from 2,501 square feet.
The homes’ exteriors and outdoor spaces take advantage of the surrounding mountain and desert views, featuring contemporary design interpretations with streamlined styling, dramatic levered roof lines, and natural textures.
With help from local interior design firm Meridian Interiors, the team took the same approach indoors, selecting materials and finishes that convey a resort lifestyle on par with the sophisticated resort next door. Geometric decorative elements and lighting selections enhance the clean contemporary aesthetic, while wood-stained cabinets add a warm, transitional touch.
“We wanted to achieve a look that would read contemporary, but not stark and not cold, so we alleviated the modern touches with our use of stone and natural materials. We wanted the interiors to be light and warm, in a neutral palette infused with peeks of color, just like the desert,” says Marcus Webb. G
enerous balconies and expansive terraces with swimming pools enhance the residences’ access to the outdoors. Though research found that snowbirds seek open, outdoor spaces, the brazen Arizona sun led the team to add protective and essential coverings to the home’s outdoor spaces.
“It was essential to provide the maximum indoor–outdoor living while being sensitive to the environment, hence the expansive bi-fold door systems, the covered loggias and terraces, outdoor fireplaces and spa pools and water features,” says Marcus Webb.
In addition, several homes sit on the resort’s short course, with golf course views in the foreground and Camelback in the distance. Offering nearly custom homes on a production timeline, the company’s Design Studio—which is a standard resource at any New Home Co. community—offers buyers the option to personalize design decisions from where the electrical and plumbing lines are laid to the fixtures, flooring materials, interior paint, kitchen and bath surrounds, and appliances, as well as extras including fully enclosed glass wine rooms, pools and decks, and outdoor fireplaces.
Design Studio consultants work with buyers and the construction team to deliver a seamless experience. Aliso Viejo, Calif.–based New Home Co. established a division in Arizona soon after construction on the project began, and plans to extend its product offerings in the Sonoran desert city that ranked fourth on BUILDER’s 2017 list of the country’s fastest-growing markets.
“We are constantly looking to build in cities with growing employment centers, great education and retail infrastructure—communities where we can reward and be rewarded for thoughtful planning and architecture,” says Marcus Webb.
Project The Residences and Villas at Mountain Shadows
Location Paradise Valley, Ariz.
Designer/builder The New Home Co., Aliso Viejo, Calif.
Size Residences: 3,049 to 3,915; Villas: 2,501 to 3,615 square feet
Site size 10.5 acres
Price $1.4-3M
