A Southern Utah Sanctuary Between Three National Parks Asks $8M

Enjoy a saltwater pool and spa, gym, infrared sauna, and hiking trails aplenty.

63 E Colima Road, Washington, Utah, is currently listed at $8,000,000 by Kylee Willard and Eddy Ortiz at Summit Sotheby’s International Realty.

This custom-built home by C. Blake Homes is located in Southern Utah’s newest gated community Solente, with concierge-style service and access to six hiking trails less than two miles away. 

The gourmet kitchen boasts Sub-Zero, Wolf appliances, two ovens, two steam ovens, an induction cooktop, two House of Rohl sinks, a built-in banquette, walnut cabinets, and a large walk-in pantry with amazing views. Two wet bars round the space out to make entertaining a breeze. 

Custom touches permeate the home including real walnut accents on both the exterior and interior, stunning entryway baseboards, and intricate custom trim on bathroom walls. Each bathroom has backlit soapboxes in all showers, while the bedrooms have backlit ceiling trays and outdoor seating areas to enjoy views from every room. 

Designed for both relaxation and entertainment, the property includes a saltwater pool and spa, a fully equipped gym system, an infrared sauna, and multiple fireplaces—four indoors and three outdoors. Modern technology enhances everyday living with a built-in Sonos sound system, a Hague water system, and quartzite countertops from Italy. 

The home’s exterior is as striking as its interior, featuring exposed aggregate concrete, C-channel metal beams, and walnut accents that blend seamlessly with the surrounding open space. 

Situated in a serene setting with views from every room, the home was designed as a sanctuary. The home is a short drive to the massive cliffs of Zion National Park, the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon National Park, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. There are four large reservoirs nearby and thousands of public acres for the adventurous at heart. 

Listing Details 

Bedrooms: 4 

Baths: 4 full, 2 partial 

Year Built: 2025 

Square Feet: 37,166

Plot Size: 0.44 acres

Courtesy of Summit Sotheby's International Realty

Courtesy of Summit Sotheby's International Realty

Courtesy of Summit Sotheby's International Realty

See the full story on Dwell.com: A Southern Utah Sanctuary Between Three National Parks Asks $8M
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Ask an Expert: A Guide for Choosing the Right Windows and Doors With Your Builder

General contractor Brad Leavitt gives us insights into the biggest considerations homeowners might be overlooking.

Brad Leavitt is no stranger to a construction site. Raised in Southern California, he grew up around the trades—Leavitt’s grandfather started an electrical company after retiring from the Navy, and his dad and five uncles are all electricians. Continuing the family legacy, Leavitt became an electrician himself, before breaking into the world of luxury residential homebuilding—leading to the founding his own company, A Finer Touch Construction, in 2013 in Arizona.

Obvious shortcomings of the construction industry—notably, the lack of communication and transparency with clients—led Leavitt to found AFT Construction more than 10 years ago. Between a client portal, dedicated project coordinator, and real-time site updates, client communication is a hallmark of AFT’s award-winning process. Pulling from his toolbox of experience, Leavitt shares his pro tips for successful client-builder communication when tackling critical design decisions—including the all-important window and door selection.

Wall-to-wall glazing on multiple sides of the home helps create a fluid indoor/outdoor experience, expanding the home’s usable square footage. 

Photo: Marvin

Identify solar vulnerability 

When it comes to the early stages of design, it’s important to consider site orientation and pinpoint areas of solar vulnerability. "One thing we have to look at is, where is that sun hitting the house?" says Leavitt. To effectively analyze exposure, Leavitt and his team use Building Information Modeling (BIM) to zero in on locations with heightened solar contact. "We render homes and lay them out because that sun from the southern hemisphere in June, July, August, September is beating on the south and west of the home," Leavitt explains. By identifying areas of elevated solar vulnerability, Leavitt and his team can design and implement protection measures for glazed openings. 

Don’t limit the architecture

For many clients building custom homes, indoor/outdoor living is top of mind. In Arizona, Leavitt emphasizes, "It’s essential." Designing homes for seamless indoor/outdoor flow often yields large expanses of glass—which can create practical and budgetary challenges. "We never want to limit the architecture to have less glass," says Leavitt. "We always make sure that it’s protected, and you can do that in several ways." Some of these ways, Leavitt suggests, include overhangs, automated pocket shades, or triple-pane windows in especially vulnerable areas where overhangs aren’t an option.

Handcrafted with premium wood (interior) and durable aluminum (exterior), the Marvin Ultimate Multi-Slide door can be configured in widths as large as 60 feet. 

Photo: Marvin

The process is just as important as the product

When it comes to window framing—especially with specialized construction methods—the technical install process can be just as significant as the windows themselves. The structural design of the home may impact the cost and precision required to frame and install the windows. "We do a lot of ICF—Insulated Concrete Form—construction," says Leavitt. Instead of wood-framed walls, walls are composed of styrofoam and concrete. "Because of that, you have to have a bigger opening, because there's rebar and concrete there," says Leavitt. "With the bigger opening, you have plywood set inside that concrete so that you can install the window." Unlike a wood-framed house, this method of construction requires a higher level of precision, considering the smaller margin of error with concrete. Any adjustments or reframing "would be a matter of jackhammering and cutting concrete, which is a big deal," says Leavitt.

Consider mixing and matching

"One thing we love about working with Marvin is they have such a diversified portfolio of products," Leavitt says. This expansive portfolio can support modern or traditional architectural styles—and everything in between. When we’re doing aluminum wood clad [windows], that would typically lean more traditional," says Brad. "When we’re doing modern or contemporary, we’ll use aluminum [interior and exterior], because the profile is a lot thinner," he adds. For transitional styles, Brad doesn’t shy away from mixing and matching—a creative approach enabled by the variety and versatility of the Marvin portfolio.   

Practicality and ease of install can directly impact on-site workflow—creating timing and cost implications. The Marvin Skycove—a one-of-a-kind suspended window that Leavitt discovered while visiting Marvin’s showroom at 7 Tide in Boston—provides an install-ready window bench option. "That's always been a challenge for us," Leavitt says of the pop-out window. "It’s always been hard to build, whereas we could buy that whole unit from Marvin."

Photo: Marvin

See the full story on Dwell.com: Ask an Expert: A Guide for Choosing the Right Windows and Doors With Your Builder
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Can the Malibu Mansion Kanye Ruined Be Saved? Plus, Everything Else You Need to Know About This Week

In the news: An Icelandic wheelchair ramp project sets a new precedent for accessibility, Rocket Co.’s buying spree to control the housing market, L.A.’s newest plan to turn offices into housing, and more.

• In 2021, designer and wheelchair user Haraldur "Halli" Thorleifsson launched Ramp Up Iceland—an accessibility project that builds free wheelchair ramps—after a single step blocked him from entering a store. Four years and 1,756 ramps later, the project is expanding to Paris and Ukraine with Thorleifsson’s message to cities everywhere: "There’s no excuse, just do it." (Fast Company)
• Rocket Co. is dropping more than $9 billion to control every step of homebuying, from browsing on Redfin to getting a mortgage and servicing it through Mr. Cooper. Here’s how it could change how we buy homes, for better or worse. (Barron’s)

• The Tadao Ando beach house Kanye West bought for $57 million before bizarrely gutting it—he stripped windows, plumbing, and even a roof—recently went back on the market for $39 million. The Malibu property, which was mid-renovation when it listed, found another buyer earlier this week. They now face recovering it from the ashes of L.A.’s fires—and West’s dubious design choices. (Curbed)

The City of Los Angeles is planning to turn vacant offices into residences.

Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

• Los Angeles recently approved Adaptive Reuse Ordinance 2.0, an ambitious plan to tackle the housing crisis by turning vacant offices and underused buildings into residential spaces. (ArchDaily)  

• Dr. Lucy Jones warns that climate-fueled wildfires are now a greater threat to L.A. than earthquakes. With weak enforcement of building codes, the city is dangerously unprepared, she says. Here’s why she thinks residents shouldn’t rely on government action to prepare the next fire. (Dwell)

Top image courtesy of The Oppenheim Group/Roger Davies

Why We Need the Nation’s First Public Housing Museum

Opening this week in Chicago, the National Public Housing Museum wants to reinvigorate our interest in collective well-being by tackling dominant narratives—of crime, poverty, and eventual destruction—head on.

A 1936 advertisement for the New York City Housing Authority depicts the clamor of city life: a jumble of line drawings depict a leaping alley cat, trash can, train, and fire escape. Bold text in a quintessential Art Deco font plastered diagonally across the image reads, "Must we always have this? Why not HOUSING?," addressing both the energy and desperation of urban life in 1930s America. Funded by the Works Progress Administration, the ad was of a time when the federal government created massive public works projects across America to uplift the poor during the Great Depression.

A 1936 poster promoting planned housing as the solution to a host of inner-city problems shows an inkblot on which elements of inner-city life are drawn. 

Photo courtesy Library of Congress

Though that era is now long over, the ad still feels relevant. We’ve reached a record high of unhoused people across the country: new housing construction is slow, rent costs burden more than 50 percent of Americans, and building housing is only getting more expensive. We may have driverless taxis coasting through cities and technology that delivers anything you desire in a matter of hours…but why not housing, indeed?

The advertisement is one of many artifacts on display at the new National Public Housing Museum (NPHM) in Chicago, the country’s only museum devoted to U.S. public housing, which opens April 4. Unlike other types of history museums which seek to keep the past alive, the NPHM is in a unique position because public housing itself isn’t, technically, extinct. People still inhabit public housing developments constructed across the country after the U.S. Congress committed to building public housing in the National Housing Acts of 1935 and 1937. As such, the NPHM is doing something a bit different. They’re not preserving objects and artifacts to encase public housing in amber; instead, the space squarely seeks to reinvigorate our interest in collective well-being by tackling public housing’s dominant narrative—one of crime, poverty, and eventual destruction—head on.

Located in Chicago’s Little Italy neighborhood, the NPHM is housed in the remaining structure that was once part of the Jane Addams Homes—a 1937 low-rise public housing development that was mostly demolished beginning in 2002. According to NPHM executive director Lisa Lee, the building itself is the museum’s biggest artifact, saved by a group of former public housing residents when the City of Chicago embarked on its 1999 Plan for Transformation that got rid of 18,000 public housing units and displaced more than 16,000 people. At that point, it had been the largest net loss of affordable housing in the entire United States, says Lee.

An exterior view of Chicago’s (now mostly demolished) Jane Addams Homes in 1949.

Photo by Hedrich-Blessing Collection/Chicago History Museum/Getty Images

An archival photo shows children playing in fountains and on animal sculptures in the courtyard of the Jane Addams Homes public housing project.

Photo by Hedrich-Blessing Collection/Chicago History Museum/Getty Images

See the full story on Dwell.com: Why We Need the Nation’s First Public Housing Museum
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From the Archive: How Renegade Architecture Firms Challenged the Status Quo

Starting in the 1960s, Archigram, Ant Farm, and Superstudio questioned the very fundamentals of architecture, from its relationship to society to the production of buildings.

As a part of our 25th-anniversary celebration, we’re republishing formative magazine stories from before our website launched. This story previously appeared in Dwell’s July/August 2006 issue.

"In science fiction we dig out prophetic information regarding geodesic nets, pneumatic tubes and plastic domes and bubbles....Our document is the space comic; its reality is in the gesture, design and natural styling of hardware new to our decade-the capsule, the rocket, the bathyscope, the Zidpark, the handy-pak."

These words, excerpted from editorials in Archigram 3 and 4 (1963 and 1964) and penned by Peter Cook, cofounder of the new defunct London-based architecture collective Archigram, express the excitement of a period beginning is the early ’60s when renegade architects around the globe questioned the very fundamentals of architecture, from its relationship to society to the production of buildings.

Influenced by the roiling movements in art, media, politics, and technology, they had names and group identities that bring to mind rock bands rather than architecture firms: the Metabolics, Superstudio, Ant Farm, and Archizoom. Instead of designing buildings, they more often created fantasy utopias, entire cityscapes on paper that were never built but which excited an entire generation and encouraged a wholesale reevaluation of the built environment.

In different ways and through different media—from gonzo graphics to film to performance art—many of them explored the impact of new materials, production processes, and the mobile lifestyle promised by the auto and aeronautical industries and information technology. "All of them were dealing with different modes of communicating architecture," says David Erdman, cofounder of the design collaborative Servo. "And they were developing new languages of architecture that dealt with the new things it contained."

Analyzing and critiquing the pervasive corporate modernism and overly rationalist urban planning of that period, these architectural outcasts seized on irony and wit to make their point. "This was a breakthrough moment when the explosion of new materials and radical lifestyles were driving a vision of architecture that was vaguely nomadic and not oriented toward the acquisition of possessions," explains Craig Hodgetts, architect, professor of architecture, and longtime friend of the Ant Farm group. "The ideal was not the luxury bath we see today but the airplane bathroom."

These collectives "introduced whimsy and subjectivity and insolence and irony back into architecture," says Stephen Nowlin, director of the Williamson Gallery at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. "At the time it was almost sacrilegious that they would do this. But that constructive insolence is one of the most important things you can teach in a design school." In recent years there's been a renewed interest in these counter movements with numerous traveling exhibits and academics doing weighty scholarship on their work.

The most influential and productive collective was Archigram, the eldest of the renegade groups. Its members (Peter Cook, Warren Chalk, Dennis Crompton, David Greene, Ron Herron, and Mike Webb) created an astonishing 900 drawings of pen-and-ink and collaged images between 1961 and 1974. The six met in the late ’5os while holding down day jobs at a large construction firm in London. Their nights, however, were spent feverishly drawing imaginary, mobile, temporary environments with electronic age names like the Capsule Home, the Plug-in City, and the Walking City, a megastructure that could plod across the land like a vast robotic animal.

They published their projects, along with essays and poems and the work of other designers they considered to be coconspirators against the establishment, in nine issues of an underground magazine they collaged together called Archigram, first published in May 1961.

See the full story on Dwell.com: From the Archive: How Renegade Architecture Firms Challenged the Status Quo

A Charming Waterfront Cottage and Studio in Provincetown Hits the Market for $3.9M

This was once the home of playwright Eugene O'Neill as well as photographer Joel Meyerowitz.

593 Commercial Street in Provincetown, Massachusetts, is currently listed at $3,925,000 by Gabby Hanna at Gibson Sotheby’s International Realty.

This three-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bathroom compound blends casual beach charm with modern amenities, offering a serene escape amid views of Provincetown Harbor. Nestled amid lush gardens, this nearly double-wide waterfront lot with a cottage and separate studio is a rare gem.

The two-bedroom, one-and-a-half-bathroom cottage feels like a step back in time, with wide pine floors, exposed wood beams, and a wood-burning fireplace. The kitchen and bathroom boast modern living yet maintain an authentic quality of the historic home, first of Eugene O'Neill in 1916 and later of the photographer Joel Meyerowitz.

The inviting living room features large sliders that open onto the waterfront deck, allowing you to enjoy stunning bay and lighthouse views. The well-appointed kitchen features butcher block countertops and ample cabinetry, perfect for preparing meals while taking in the sunset. A stylishly renovated full bath with contemporary tilework blends modern comfort with functionality. Situated alongside is the laundry area, complete with a folding station.

The second-floor staircase, framed with boat oar bannisters, leads to a landing with the guest bedroom to the left, the primary bedroom to the right, and a half-bath in the middle. The primary bedroom offers panoramic water views, creating a peaceful sanctuary. Ample storage exists with built-in cabinetry, including under the platform bed, and a wardrobe on the landing provides additional hanging space. 

The guest bedroom overlooks the front of the home and includes abundant closets and built-ins for storage. The charming half-bath completes the comfort of the bedroom level.

Across the lush lawn, the stand-alone studio suite with its own full bath and kitchen offers flexible living arrangements, ideal for guests, extended family, or potential rental income with its own private entry and direct beach access. Offering privacy, the space could make for a stunning waterfront at-home office.

The highlight of the property is the spacious waterfront deck with outdoor shower. Unparalleled views of Provincetown Harbor is paired with landscaping that provides a privacy rarely available with waterfront properties. Surrounding the property, lush gardens add color and tranquility to the outdoor experience, while a shed offers additional storage space for bikes or gardening tools.

Listing Details 

Bedrooms: 3

Baths: 2 full, 1 partial

Year Built: 1900

Square Feet: 1,098

Plot Size: 0.2 acres

Courtesy of Gibson Sotheby's International Realty

Courtesy of Gibson Sotheby's International Realty

Courtesy of Gibson Sotheby's International Realty

See the full story on Dwell.com: A Charming Waterfront Cottage and Studio in Provincetown Hits the Market for $3.9M
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In Los Angeles, a Modern Farmhouse With an ADU and Pickleball Court Seeks $8.9M

A sleek and soothing escape in Bel Air awaits.

10560 Dolcedo Way in Los Angeles, California, is currently listed at $8,995,000 by Shamon Shamonki at Sotheby's International Realty - Brentwood Brokerage.

This newly reimagined modern farmhouse is nestled within a coveted enclave of prestigious Lower Bel Air, minutes away from the iconic Bel Air Hotel. 

Resting on over half an acre of verdant grounds, the five-bedroom, five-and-a-half bathroom residence is illuminated by soaring and sky-lit 18-foot ceilings that create a bright and airy atmosphere throughout. This residence is all about the details, and was designed for indoor/outdoor enjoyment with fire-proof metal roofing and interlocking fold-away steel and glass walls.

The floor plan holds lavish en suite bedrooms, with luxe finishes and indulgent steam showers. The bathrooms are outfitted with Graff products and stunning Italian fixtures from Gessi and Fantini. The primary suite is nothing short of a sanctuary, with a spa-inspired bathroom that includes a freestanding soaking tub, walk-in steam shower, generous dual vanities, a cavernous walk-in closet, and private indoor and outdoor lounging areas. 

Designed by DI Group, the kitchen is a chef’s dream, complete with top-tier (and hidden) Miele appliances, bespoke cabinetry, a drinking water system purified via reverse osmosis, and a hyper-filtration system. An expansive open-plan layout connects the kitchen, living areas, and resort-like backyard, creating the ultimate setting for both intimate gatherings and grand entertaining. 

Step outside to a private oasis, set up for al fresco dining with a corner bar. Play a game of pickleball on the court with a private lounging area, or enjoy the platform that overlooks lush tree tops, villas and sunsets over the mountains. 

In addition, the property includes an impeccably designed and permitted guest house (ADU) for visitors, extended family, exclusive office, or potential for rental income.

Listing Details 

Bedrooms: 5 

Baths: 5 full, 1 partial 

Year Built: 1936

Square Feet: 3,800

Plot Size: 0.6 acres

Courtesy of Sotheby's International Realty - Brentwood Brokerage

Courtesy of Sotheby's International Realty - Brentwood Brokerage

Courtesy of Sotheby's International Realty - Brentwood Brokerage

See the full story on Dwell.com: In Los Angeles, a Modern Farmhouse With an ADU and Pickleball Court Seeks $8.9M
Related stories:

• This $1.6M Gregory Ain Midcentury Just Listed for the First Time in Decades
• This £2M Home in a Converted Schoolhouse Might Be the Best in Its Class
• For $1M, You Can Scoop Up a Sleek Black Cabin in the Catskills