Inside a Sophisticated Aspen Home Nestled in the Mountains

Troy J. McMullen

December 9, 2024 at 8:00 a.m.·7 min read

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Growing up amid the mountains of Colorado has long informed architect Cristof Eigelberger’s approach to designing homes. His aesthetic ideals of form and proportion—along with his own love of the great outdoors—has been the catalyst for creating properties that blend seamlessly into their rustic, natural environments. So when a New York client commissioned him to build a home in the shadow of the Aspen mountains, Eigelberger employed his usual dexterous handling of material and texture to create a ranch-style residence rooted in modernism. The architect collaborated on the five-bedroom residence with AD100 interior designer Shawn Henderson, who employed an understated elegance to deliver warmth to the interiors.

Expansive 30-foot openings merge the interior of the home with the breathtaking vistas of the Ajax, Aspen Highlands, Snowmass, and Buttermilk mountains around it. A lofty, wood-vaulted ceiling crowns the living and dining areas while infusing the space with warmth and grandeur. An open kitchen and family room includes a breakfast nook with a gabled glass end that floods the entire space with natural light and mountain views.

The family room underscores the seamless collaboration between Eigelberger and Henderson. The furnishings under the lofty, wood-vaulted ceiling include the Belgian Classic Slope Arm sofa from RH in Perennials performance textured linen weave, a custom coffee table, and custom swivel lounge chairs in Fishman’s Fabrics’ Jana wool bouclé.

Architect Cristof Eigelberger created an open-air winter sculpture garden at the center of the residence to house a site-specific piece by artist Will Ryman. The soaring red and pink rose blossoms are made of fiberglass and stainless steel and rise 15 feet in the air in the courtyard. “It’s a space that’s both dynamic and personal, bringing a moment of stillness into the heart of the home,” says Eigelberger.

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Eigelberger managed to create distinctive ways to absorb the surrounding landscape. The most conspicuous example is the open-air winter sculpture garden at the center of the residence, an intimate, confined courtyard that allows art and nature to coalesce. The clients are avid art collectors and commissioned the artist Will Ryman to create a site-specific sculpture for the home. The artist’s intuitive approach to sculpting diverse materials into expressive forms led to the creation of soaring red and pink rose blossoms made of fiberglass and stainless steel that rise as high as 15 feet into the air.

Wood-vaulted ceilings crown the living room inside the five-bedroom home, infusing the space with warmth and grandeur. “It’s a serene space where art and nature coalesce,” says Henderson. A painting by Jacqueline Humphries adds to the living room’s mix of art and nature. The custom area rug is ALT for Living. The pair of lava table lamps with a volcanic glaze were crafted by ceramicist Alison Lousada. A pair of Danish end tables by Trioh Mobler are near the sofa, and the coffee tables are custom pieces.

Henderson employed an understated elegance to the interiors. “I wanted to complement the architecture, not to distract from it,” he says. The living room includes a pair of vintage lounge chairs by Carl-Johan Boman for Oy Boman and a custom oversized sofa with upholstered cushions produced by Metrica. The ottoman is custom with upholstered Arabel Fabrics. The custom coffee tables have brass legs and Montclair honed marble from Marmi Stone.

“I wanted to create a space that was open to the elements yet curated and controlled,” Eigelberger says. The location creates a perfect intersection between art and nature that’s both dynamic and personal while also bringing a moment of stillness into the heart of the home, he adds. “In a way, it’s like a lantern that punctures the building’s architecture in the middle and allows filtered light into the rooms,” he says.

Relying less on any signature aesthetic, Shawn Henderson instead adapts to his clients’ needs by using organic textures and strong, simple forms in allowing them to express their own distinctive style. “The goal was to use subdued colors that offered a serene interior that didn’t distract from the architecture,” says Henderson, a New York–based interior designer whose skill for unpretentious luxury has made him a fixture on the international design scene for more than two decades. “I wanted to respect the architecture by having the interiors and architecture complement each other,” he adds. The result is a home nestled amidst the natural beauty of Aspen that’s equipped with a sophisticated, urbane sensibility inside.

Eigelberger Architecture & Design reimagined the rural residence carved out of a family ranch in Aspen. Expansive, 30-foot openings seamlessly merge the interior with the vistas of the surrounding mountains and a lofty, wood-vaulted ceiling crowns the living and dining areas.

Respecting the envelope allowed Henderson to deliver intimacy to a home with soaring 22-foot ceilings and spacious, open living spaces. He says he wanted to create environments throughout the home that are both inviting and visually stimulating but that also provided a cozy sanctuary for the family. “Shawn and Cristof brought this property to life in ways we couldn’t have imagined,” says the homeowner. New York natives, he and his wife now live full-time inside the 7,700-square-foot home with their two children. The five-acre property was carved out of a family ranch that’s lucky enough to have unobstructed views of all four Aspen mountains. “Watching them work together was inspiring,” the client adds of the architect and designer. “There was this sort of symbiotic relationship between the two of them almost from the beginning.”