A delightful spec house on East Alameda
Courtesy Meleah Artley
Story by Paul Weideman Photos by Jane Phillips unless noted otherwise
This is the first of four units being built in the new Compound at La Joya Escondida located off the dirt section of East Alameda Street, between Canyon Road and the Santa Fe River. Builder/designer Philip Alarid said he wants to do at least one unique feature on each house. The central standout feature here is the long barrel-vault, lined with travertine tiles, over the kitchen and dining room. “It opens up the space and we have LED lighting hidden along the long lower edges on both sides of the vault, which gives you a lot of light for very little cost,” Alarid said. The native Santa Fean has Kiva Homes LLC with partners Mike and Lynnette Mallory. The spec house, just completed in December, is being advertised as “the perfect Eastside pied-a-terre.” It’s 1,745 square feet with two bedrooms and two bathrooms, walls of hand-troweled plaster and floors of engineered white oak. Sustainability is a priority for Alarid. “I was able to get this house to the gold-level green standard. The HERS rating is 58, and you get a tax credit whenever you’re below 60.” Among the green features are exterior walls framed with 10-inch lumber to maximize insulation and a high-efficiency tankless hot-water system. The built-in wifi music system is controllable by means of the owner’s smart phone. The living room, warmed in the wintertime by a kiva fireplace, sports an entire wall of glass — french doors with sidelights and transoms — outside is a flagstone-paved patio with banco seating around a large fireplace. The living room boasts a carved feature beam, an architectural antique from India, purchased at Seret and Sons, as were several of the doors in the house. The living-room ceiling beams are ponderosa pine salvaged from the 2001 Cerro Grande Fire.
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March 2013
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