An emerging style swaps color and midcentury staples for a return to nature.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY LANCE GERBER
Where, pray tell, in the commandments of design is a devotion to the signature style of a home’s geographical location carved in terrazzo? Because the cool, crisp, Southwest-inspired architecture of this one-time Modernism Week showcase house is synonymous with the High Desert — just not our High Desert. You could say its bones, from the steel vigas to the terrazzo floor, have a rebellious nature. So, in 2020, when Manhattan Beach–based film and television producer Ivan Dudynsky purchased the weekend getaway, located in The Mesa neighborhood of South Palm Springs, he instinctively sought to diverge from the expected aesthetic.
“Although we appreciate Palm Springs design, we didn’t want our house to be so midcentury that it felt cliché,” says Dudynsky, who shares the home with his wife, Audrey Morrissey, and their 10-year-old son, Ronin. He enlisted architect Todd Johnston and designer John Ruggiero, principals of the design studio Johnston Ruggiero, to create a stylistically rigorous domicile that would not only satisfy his artistic appetite as a self-diagnosed “design junkie,” but also bring warmth to the 3,000-square-foot home’s voluminous, sunstruck spaces. “More like what you might find in Joshua Tree,” Dudynsky told the designers. He wasn’t referring to the area’s homespun-hipster aesthetic, but rather the intention behind it: a high-vibrational intersection of design and nature.
“Think of it as the ‘new’ Palm Springs style, as opposed to being anti–Palm Springs,” Ruggiero clarifies. While the designers and the homeowner fell into an easy, choose-your-own-adventure process (Dudynsky would approve objects and furniture via text message, blissfully unaware of their final placement), there was one strict guideline that was gospel to Ruggiero’s ears: “Don’t show me any knockoffs.”
The transparent, pivot-style front door offers a clear first impression of the home’s sheer openness, thanks to many glass expanses, but at the cost of storage space. Just beyond, a thoughtful vignette in the entry serves as a primer on the design to come. A cluster of dark tree roots subjects the tidy geometry of a three-dimensional wall treatment to its tense blackened gnarl.
“I love the play of old and new, manufactured and crafted,” Johnston says. “It’s important for different aspects of architecture and design to be in dialogue with each other.” Such synergy is elegantly epitomized in the primary bedroom, where a custom Lucite desk — made from a substantial, manufactured material — practically vaporizes in sunlight, while the pebble-like Pacha loveseat by Pierre Paulin and plush shag (uncommonly used as bed-frame upholstery) introduce cloudlike downiness that juxtaposes otherwise unyielding surfaces, including the rugged San Jacinto Mountains in the distance.
Speaking of natural landmarks, a black-and-white custom Flypaper mural of Joshua trees for Ronin’s room serves as a cheeky reminder of Dudynsky’s original inspiration for the interior design. To keep this space relevant beyond the tween years, Ruggiero chose an earthy palette for grown-up designer pieces, like a sienna-hued Patricia Urquiola Tufty-Bed and clay-colored suede Togo chairs inspired by Michel Ducaroy’s iconic 1970s design. Even more important is keeping this space relevant during the tween years. To wit, a custom ink-on-canvas work by Palm Springs artist Hank Hudson features Andy Warhol’s Elvises donning Boba Fett helmets, a tribute to Ronin’s favorite Star Wars character. The checkered Moroccan rug revives memories of classic Vans slip-ons that still garner multigenerational appeal.
To remedy the home’s lack of storage, Johnston created custom casework for Ronin’s room and throughout the house. With oak-faced cabinetry and simple open shelves that give once-empty dimensions new purpose, the architect evolved the former spec house into a residence for real life, where style and stash are not mutually exclusive concepts.
Just because thou addeth doesn’t mean thou also taketh away. The great room is flanked by two original spec-house fixtures: an imposing fireplace clad in glossy-black-faceted tiles and a dark galley kitchen of equal encumbrance. Little else remains besides these two elements that the designers obliged for the home’s foremost multirecreational space. Mario Bellini’s Camaleonda tufted sectional, upholstered in supple cognac leather (a nod to Dudynsky’s collection of luxury cars), fashions a modern-day conversation pit that is the main draw in the space. To maximize opportunities for amusement, the homeowners — who have hosted friends for Halloween parties, stargazing, and late-night DJ sessions with chocolate-chip cookie bakes — eschewed a traditional dining set for a pool table, cuing up meals at the breakfast bar or the card table by Daniel Pollock — a sculptural piece with a hulking, solid-ashwood surface.
“Everything in this house is so weighty,” says Ruggiero, inadvertently underscoring the gravitas of each piece, including the great room’s most poetic curiosities. Jørgen Høvelskov’s Harp chair, inspired by the prow of a Viking ship, is woven with flag line and begging to be strummed, while Ukrainian designer Sergey Makhno’s amorphous Khmara resin pendants recall floating sea creatures. Besides the whimsical buoyancy that the lamps add to a leisurely tableau of influential objets d’arts, they are also a mesmerizing sight in the desert. The oceangoing figures out of their would-be habitat, if you will, are not unlike this modern hacienda disrupting the Palm Springs vernacular. “I love being surprised by design,” Ruggiero says.