Photo by Chris Pilaro 

Window upon
the world

Bring in the outdoors

By Jennifer Pattison

A window is an ever-changing piece of art. Floating in a wall, it continually captures the exquisite work of the world’s greatest artist. The scene beheld alters minutely with each glance and dramatically with every season, but no matter what view is perceived there is always a type of beauty to be found through a window.

A flawlessly framed scene from the Wood River Valley’s extensive portfolio acts not only as the perfect accent to the perfect home, it also unifies outdoor with indoor. A window welcomes the outdoors, highlights and celebrates it, but politely insists that it leave the rain, snow and wind at the sill.

The quest to own the valley’s most spectacular view is one that drives many livelihoods in this area from construction to real estate.

“Mecca,” as architect James Ruscitto describes it, is the ski resort’s premier vista, Bald Mountain. “We call it Mecca because everyone has got to look toward it—that’s what it’s all about!”

Carol’s Dollar Mountain Lodge, the resort’s new ski lodge in Sun Valley, was designed with the express purpose of seizing the best view of Baldy. A standard window wall, the most typical way to frame a view, was utilized.

“We spent a lot of time aligning the axis of this window on Baldy so it is framed right over the rolling parts of Dollar and the valley of Ketchum. It’s almost perfectly framed,” explained Ruscitto, whose firm, Ruscitto Latham Blanton, designed the lodge.

While the view will hopefully never change, the way Baldy and its contemporaries are brought into valley homes has become a constant quest for originality.

“It gets tough to find new ways to deal with views,” said Ruscitto. “There are only so many things you can do.”

Some examples of alternative framing include juxtaposing the shape of the window with the shape of the view.

“We may use a radius window even though the views outside might be peaky mountains, or take a view through more than one window and maybe offset them a little bit so they’re kind of quirky. We’ve also done some totally round windows where the view outside is geometric, creating a contradiction in shape and form.”

In more traditional homes, however, where a zigzag-style window could look somewhat out of place, the positioning of multiple windows can create originality. A window’s real purpose, after all, is to let light in. Using a collaboration of glass to highlight one spectacular view was the purpose of another Ruscitto Latham Blanton design, a home on the hills overlooking Bigwood Golf Club.

“This house has a lot of interesting window elements,” said Ruscitto. “As you come in the main entrance your eye goes right to Baldy. But then you start seeing these little vignette windows on either side of you and it gets more exciting as you work down the room to the classic view of Mecca.”

“The key to this design is the multitude of windows and how they work with each other and with the views, and how they bring in the light. This whole thing is a pretty successful example of how to use window and light and glass.”

The major inhibitor to breathtaking, view-grabbing windows is the constant growth of the valley. It is rare now to find a lot with unobstructed views in this exploding housing market.

Frank and Suz Cameron’s home in Elkhorn exemplifies one creative solution to enhance the sense of outdoors indoors—without inviting in passersby. The design focuses on bringing exterior materials—such as the natural stone from the area and big logs from Dollarhide Summit—into an interior envelope. It also frames available views, brings light in and obscures unsightly surrounding elements.

There is no large window wall in this home. Instead, a selection of vignette windows highlights views at varying heights just above ground level. Then, long narrow windows encircle the house just below the ceiling, incorporating a panorama of mountain views, effectively cutting out undesirable views in-between. Logs that litter the interior decor also extend outside, further shielding the home and focusing the views.

The issue of privacy has long battled with the pursuit of views and another solution is to use stained and etched glass. Generally incorporated into entryways where glass is desired but privacy is paramount, such glasswork is predominantly used for features that are up close and personal. It can also be employed to enhance a view or focus the eye on a desired section of the view.

Jacques Bordeleau, a Sun Valley glass artist, has created various designs in his 34-year tenure that use outdoor themes such as a pheasant flying low over sagebrush to connect the indoors more closely with what is represented outside.

In one home north of Ketchum, he created a window that simultaneously obscured an unsightly overhanging roof while providing a perfect view of the rushing Big Wood River.

“As the clear glass goes up to the peak in the roof, it starts to merge with colored patterns of glass, and as it does, it turns to a milky white, obscuring the underside of the roof and blending it in.”

The effect subtly blends the glass with the room and the river outside.

Even an unobstructed view can present a challenge when designing the ultimate window.

When Jeff Anderton, owner of Denali Design and Construction, began to build his home in the southern corner of the Bellevue Triangle his aim was to create a 360-degree view of the surrounding meadows framed by the southern Picabo Hills.

“I was told it couldn’t be done, the size and positioning of the windows were such that we would get too much heat gain in the summertime and the room would become too warm.”

Undaunted by the admonishment of everyone he approached, Anderton eventually went ahead against his architect’s advice.

“He told me I was doing something wrong, and I said ‘Well maybe so, but I’m going to do it anyway.’”

Thankfully, considering the room cost him more than $100,000 to build, he wasn’t wrong.

“I installed a big exhaust fan up in the ceiling that pulls a lot of heat out of the house, and the height of the room (26 feet) enables the heat to move up into the ceiling. We also have operating windows down low to bring in cool air.”

This 18-by-25-foot-wide window room has become the heart of Anderton’s home. The (almost) 360-degree panoramic view is framed by elegant alder and provides a bright, sunny, comfortably warm room year-round.

Whether it is uniquely shaped, distinctively decorated or creatively designed, a window only offers a view; it is the view that offers possibilities. No matter how spectacular the view, don’t forget to go out and enjoy it. •