ASPEN, COLORADO
CRISTOF EIGELBERGER Architect and designer Cristof Eigelberger brings an aesthete’s eye and an engineer’s mind to some of the West’s most awe-inspiring mountain homes.
“We take the long view,” Cristof Eigelberger says of
design elements,” he says. “Then, we go from there.” And
architect-designer behind some of Aspen’s most notable
and speak to the outsized scale of mountain homes in
his design ethos. Over the past two decades, the esteemed
while the majority of his projects are large and spacious
properties has established a reputation for delivering
general, he also takes cues from other environments.
perfectly balanced, expertly rendered residences with a
“We’ve taken inspiration from old river homes in North
unique point of view, each one wowing in the moment
and South Carolina. We look everywhere, but always with
while also standing the test of time. “Perfection is only
a firm sense of what will be right here,” he says.
good in the first year,” he says, “but architecture and
design need to age. Perfection needs to age and grow and continue to become itself.”
1970s and 1980s, Cristof grew up in a restored estate that
The primary designer on most of his projects,
was slated for demolition before his father intervened.
Cristof views interior layouts in much the same way: a
“My brother and I lived in what was essentially the vault
network of multidimensional, livable moments meant to
of the house, the basement area where they’d have kept
inspire and restore in equal measure. “A lot of designing
the silver and other valuables in the 1920s when the
in the mountains comes down to how people enjoy
house was built,” he says, “so I came to understand and
and experience the outdoors,” he says. “The views, the
appreciate purpose-driven spaces very early and that was
connections to land—whether it’s to a river or a far away
a big influence on my career path.” The family became
mountain—are important, and our architecture is rooted
regular part-time residents in Aspen, back when it was
in that. Our team is made up of people who are from the
still becoming Aspen, and the dichotomy of the contrasting
mountains, so we understand that it’s not always about the
geographies—mountain and coastal—also had a profound
obvious. In the mountains, the indirect allows you to play
impact on the budding architect. “The differences between
with light and landscape. You might have this beautiful
the two places are obvious, but it brought into focus the
valley with a big peak in front of you but as the sun wraps
idea of landscape and topography and how they could
around the red rocks behind you, the scene will shift into
affect a design or an experience.”
this bursting, glowing evening vista.”
One look at his slate of recent projects and it’s easy
When Cristof moved to Aspen full-time and opened
his own studio in 2015, he married the same appreciation
to see what he means. At one, dubbed River’s Edge, he
for intentional design he learned growing up with an
positioned the master bedroom as a vantage point from
innate sense of how to uniquely approach the traditional
which to admire a pasture of wildflowers and the highland
mountain aesthetic. “We steer away from super heavy
bowl above it, as well as a nearby mountain range. “It’s the
timber trusses,” he says. “Wood absorbs a lot of light, so
same thing at Roaring Fork Ranch,” Cristof says of another
we’re careful to strike a balance between wood and plaster.
project, “in the way we oriented the rooms and worked the
It creates beautiful layers without weightiness.”
windows to see not just the cinematic shot but the broader
view of the river and everything surrounding it. That’s
Cristof is passionate about the mountains—their
quirks, crags and enduring majesty—but a bit of his heart
what makes it original and special.”
As the son of a legendary Palm Beach developer,
who launched that area’s push toward preservation in the
is beginning to long for projects a little farther afield,
The long view approach applies to his process and
ones that straddle the two landscapes he cherishes most.
material selection, too. “Plaster surfaces, moss rock,
“I would love to find something remote, Hawaii perhaps,
board-and-batten walls, copper roofs—it’s important that
that offers the perfection of the peaks but also touches the
we start with a foundation of textures for furnishings
ocean,” he says. “Can you imagine the light, the view? Now
and interiors that match and complement those exterior
that would be spectacular.”
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