High Desert Retreat | 2016-2019

Palm Desert, California, USA

Architects: Aidlin Darling Design
Design Team: Joshua Aidlin, Adam Rouse, Ben Damron, Sarah Kia, and Jeff LaBoskey
Client: Private
Photographers: Adam Rouse Photography and Joe Fletcher Photography

Sited on a rocky desert plateau outside of Palm Desert, this single-family residence is tightly nestled within a constellation of boulders, overlooking the Coachella Valley and the San Jacinto Mountain Range beyond.

The home diagram is a triptych of elements: a floating roof plane, a collection of wooden volumes, and two concrete anchor walls. The square floating roof performs numerous functions.

On the climatic side, it hovers over the home, providing respite from the beating sun both in its opaque form but also as a porous wooden lattice. A singular aperture is carved out of the roof plane, framing the dramatic sky above while also providing the pool area below with ample sun exposure.

Below the roof, the plane reside seven rectilinear volumes that contain the home's program. Conceptually, they began as a singular rectilinear mass that splits apart and slides out into the landscape to maximize the surrounding terrain's experience and create a critical open space in the center of the home. This space would become both the entry and the dining room, a location for the public and private spaces to meet; a place to break bread, and capture both sunrise and sunset as well as breezes rising up the hillside and through the house.

While the wooden volumes house the home's critical program, the garage's entry sequence to the house is articulated by the orientation and form of two concrete entry walls. They are intentionally juxtaposed to create a void between them, ultimately guiding the occupant to the home's glazed entry. The parallel concrete walls frame the entry and the dining room beyond and, most importantly, the heroic view to the East and the Coachella Valley below.