High Desert Retreat

- Richly illustrated, this monograph portrays the creative process that resulted in a stunning residence set within a desolate desert landscape

- With insight from the team at Aidlin Darling Design, this title includes drawings, sketches, and plans to help understand the design process

- High Desert Retreat beautifully illustrates the stunning residence, deliberately designed to be quiet and crisp in its setting and to serve as a contrast to the organic forms of the desert

- This book will appeal to lovers of excellent ecology-friendly design and will inspire other designers

Starting with the question "How to create a residence within this beautiful desolate site while also creating a respectful compliment to the existing ecology", Aidlin Darling Design created a soulful environment on a bluff in the high desert. Overlooking the Coachella Valley, the resulting structure nestles tightly into a constellation of existing boulders. The residence is a composition of three fundamental elements: a floating roof plane, a collection of wooden volumes, and a pair of concrete anchor walls. The stunning result is testament to the ethos of the firm to design for all the senses. The home became a framing device in which the sensuality of the surrounds is highlighted, and the boulders, Pinyon Trees and the distant mountain ranges became sculptures and paintings to be appreciated from within. The design is exceedingly crisp in its geometry, providing an intentional contrast to the organic forms of the desert. This book takes the reader through the journey from design conception to the realization.