Designed to blur the lines between the indoor and outdoor spaces, the Nita Residence celebrates the diverse beauty of the Sonoran Desert. The distinction between the built environment and the natural world is purposefully erased. Floor to ceiling glass walls and a series of distinctive courtyards connect each room to an exterior composition of color, texture, and pattern in the immersive desert landscape. For the owners, Landscape Architects Kristina Floor, PLA, FASLA and Christopher Brown, PLA, FASLA, (FLOOR Associates), this was an opportunity to design their own home based on fully integrating Modern Design aesthetics with a celebration of our desert environs.

The home was designed in close collaboration with Philip Weddle, FAIA (Weddle Gilmore Architects). Having partnered on over 30 public and private commissions over the past 25 years, including such award-winning projects as the Rio Salado Audubon Center and the McDowell Sonoran Preserve, the design team has developed a like-minded approach to integrating landscape and building architecture into a single purpose. The result is a beautiful expression of modern design, where the timeless architecture of sandblasted block, glass, wood and weathered steel acts as a quite canvas for the immersive desert landscape.


In Paradise Valley, Arizona lies the Nita Residence, a modern home designed for the desert. The pool design minimizes decking to embed the pool into the landscape with native creosote on one side and small turf panel opposite. PHOTO CREDIT: C. PORTER BROWN

Transitional Native Landscape
The home is in an area that maintains a semblance of native desert characterized by creosote flats and well-defined washes, but the site was significantly disturbed during construction. To correct this, the owners embarked on an ambitious restoration process even before the home was complete. Applying the knowledge and methodologies the firm had pioneered over the past 30 years on such projects as Lost Dog Wash and Cavaliere Park, the goal was not merely to "landscape" the house, but to recreate the native Sonoran ecosystem as it might have appeared centuries ago.

By using strictly native materials, the Landscape Architects blended the home's edges back into the surrounding environs. As a result, the perimeter landscape, visible from the street, is intentionally "nondescript" and the structure itself melds into the landscape.

This process required the import of numerous salvaged native trees including Foothill Palo Verde, Native Mesquite, and Ironwoods ranging in size from 15 gallons to 96" box; more than 250 creosote bushes, numerous jojobas, barrel cactus, and yucca, over 75 salvaged Saguaros ranging in size from 1' to 7" height) and a variety of native Opuntia. Most cacti were salvaged by the owners from other construction sites where they would have otherwise been destroyed. The entire site was top-dressed using site salvaged desert pavement to replicate the natural texture of the native desert floor.


There are sculptural collections of agaves, aloes, Senita Cactus, and native hedgehog cactus in the entry courtyard. PHOTO CREDIT C. PORTER BROWN

The result is a perimeter landscape buffer that is natural, providing shade, seasonal color and texture and effectively screening the structure from the street and neighborhood. The home itself is only revealed by transitioning through this landscape to the home itself.

 
Choreographed Arrival
The entry experience is a masterclass in sequencing and discovery. The home is approached through a series of controlled sightlines and transitional spaces designed to immerse guests into the native desert landscape, and to allow a few moments to decompress before entering the home. Asphalt transitions to sand finished concrete and stabilized decomposed granite walkways. The built environment transforms into a dense desert landscape.


The outdoor living room is embedded into native creosote and features a cast-in-place concrete linear fire feature. PHOTO CREDIT: B. TIMMERMAN

From the decomposed granite parking court, concrete steps lead to the small welcome court, which in turn leads through a weathered steel pivot gate to the arrival courtyard. Here, the palette shifts from nondescript native restoration to a curated collection of bold, sculptural succulents and cacti. These botanical forms are juxtaposed against the home's strict geometric lines, creating a reflective, gallery-like atmosphere. Turning the corner within the entry court, a first glimpse of the home is revealed through the floor to ceiling glass walls and beyond to the north courtyard. The entry / living room, conceived as a "bridge within the landscape," is wrapped in floor-to-ceiling glass, ensuring that as soon as one enters, the distinction between indoors and outdoors is effectively erased.


A cast-in-place concrete screen wall provides privacy and enclosure to the raised lounge area at the pool. PHOTO CREDIT: B. TIMMERMAN

The home is organized around a series of distinctive courtyards and outdoor rooms, each defined by a specific microclimate or function purpose. Each courtyard is unique and includes such features as an outdoor shower at the master bath, a minimalist water feature at the main entry, integrated seawalls, and a linear fire feature.


Exterior and interior spaces were designed to create strict modern proportions that seamlessly harmonize between the building and landscape architecture. PHOTO CREDIT: B. TIMMERMAN

The arrival courtyard serves as a quiet spot for entertaining while being surrounded by the ever-evolving landscape that envelops the home. Specimen Ironwoods provide filtered shade for the owners' dramatic collection of succulents and cacti. It features a Zen-like water feature: a simple plane of 1/4" deep water flowing evenly over four edges into cobble-filled reveals. The feature provides a gentle acoustic echo and acts as a mirror for the sky. It has also become a vital watering hole for local wildlife, attracting everything from Hummingbirds and Burrowing Owls to Kit Foxes and the areas resident Bobcats.


The Easter Lily Cactus (Selenicereus grandifloras) is a small, spherical, drought-tolerant cactus, perfect for the desert environment in Paradise Valley. At night, the plant blooms into a large, fragrant pink and white flower.

The north courtyard opposite the main entry overlooks the remodeled pool and small lawn area of hybrid turf. This courtyard's northern exposure and wide overhanging soffit provide the ideal environment for the owners' collection of less hardy plants such as Foxtail Agave (Agave attenuata), small aloe species, Carrion Plants (Stepelia gigantea), and Haworthia species. Beyond the courtyard, the minimalist pool is surrounded by landscape and seamlessly fades into the creosote and native desert. The original block wall behind the pool was removed and replaced with a uniquely designed enclosure fence that is virtually invisible, creating a strong visual connection to the large arroyo along the northern property, further emphasizing the connection to landscape.


Whale's Tongue Agave (Agave ovatifolia) is a slow-growing succulent with large, blue-green cupped leaves that can grow up to 3-4 feet. This drought-tolerant plant handles cold weather better than other agaves, surviving temperatures that are below zero.

The kitchen connects to the veranda and outdoor living room at the rear of the home. Used for entertaining, these outdoor spaces are accessed through a series of floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors that stack to one side to create a movable wall that literally brings the landscape into the home. The veranda is oriented around a large existing Blue Palo Verde tree that forms the ceiling of this outdoor living room, providing filtered shade and intense spring bloom. A 14-foot-long linear fire feature, made of cast-in-place concrete, provides a warm focal element for evening gatherings.


The Cereus (Selenicereus) blooms for a singular night, usually in the summer. The flower opens at dusk and wilts by dawn.

Growing within the Blue Palo Verde tree is a spectacular 20"x20" Dragon Fruit Cactus (Hylocereus undatus), grown from a small cutting gifted to the owners by a friend. Several nights a year, this amazing plant will explode with nearly 100, six-inch-wide blooms.


Textural massing of agaves and aloes provide spectacular spring displays of color. PHOTO CREDIT: B. TIMMERMAN

The east wing of the house is bookended with two unique courtyards. On the northside, a raised steel planter with a large, salvaged Foothill Palo Verde and a textural understory of Whales Tongue Agave and Argentinian Giant Cacti forms a buffer between the main bedroom and the pool lounge deck.

At the opposite side, off the main bath is the essential shower oasis. This courtyard is open-air but fully enclosed. Used daily, the water from the shower allows for the creation of this wonderful sub-tropical oasis, serving as the perfect counterpoint to the otherwise arid environment landscape.


Salvaged barrel cacti, Senita, agaves, and aloes are massed to create sculpture, texture, and color through each individual courtyard.
PHOTO CREDIT: B. TIMMERMAN

This project is the culmination of more than 30 years of pioneering work in desert landscape architecture design. The home demonstrates how desert modernism can successfully approach the landscape and natural systems as primary occupants of the site and blend the boundaries between the built and natural environments.

As seen in LASN magazine, April 2026.