The Ghost Wash House, as this private property is called, was designed by Architecture – Infrastructure – Research, Inc., which is an architecture and urban design firm focused on applying advanced research methods and sustainable practices into designs that cover the needs and wishes of each client, and which was founded by Darren Petrucci in 2001. The home is located along the lower hillside of the north side of Camelback Mountain in Paradise Valley, a small, affluent town in Maricopa County, Arizona, in the United States. It was completed in 2017 and covers a total ground area of 8,500 square feet.
The site is flanked by two desert washes that move water from the top of the mountain into the valley below. A third topographic condition — a “Ghost Wash” — runs through the center of the site, giving the property its name, and is framed by brick bars.
The eastern of these two protects the wash from the desert sun that shines upon it in the morning. It also houses the garages, the kitchen, an office, and the family room. The western bar shields the property from the intensely hot west sun as it sets in the valley. In turn, it houses the private areas of the home, such as the bedrooms, another family room, and a recreation space. The living room and dining room are house in the interior of a long sequence of courtyards and gardens that flow along the Ghost Wash from the south entry to the north pool house.
