The Chamisa Residence was designed for a property located in the lower northern foothills of Santa Fe, New Mexico.  As the capital of the state with a population of 76,000 people, there are many challenging regulations that influenced architectural decisions.  Santa Fe is located in a high desert mountain climate limited in water, which made it essential to integrate a water collection system into the roof design.

Due to the lack of distant views, a wash running through the property, and the regulations limiting ridge-top construction on the east side of the site, locating the building envelope was a complicated problem.  The final decision was to stay on the northwest corner of the property to eliminate the need to build a culvert across the wash, allowing those funds to be used on other areas of the construction cost.  This decision also reduced the cost to connect to the utilities and made it easier to integrate passive solar concepts into the design. 

The greatest challenge of this residence was to provide an integrated connection to nature for the residents and the building while keeping within current building practices.  The property is low in the landscape surrounded by the foothills.  The House needed to take on that feature by sitting into the hillside on the northwest side, sinking down and away from the road.