Luca Marino-Baker, lead architect at Tierra Concepts, Inc. is interviewed by the Santa Fe New Mexican Home Magazine, 2025: The Year Ahead
“Even though the biggest issue we’re facing right now is the fire insurance issue, there’s a benefit here, in the sense that it’s making places like the Galisteo Basin and Lamy, they’re suddenly becoming extremely desirable. Places where you don’t have the restrictions. What we’ve noticed is that people are like, All right, we’re biting the bullet. We’re spending a fortune no matter. What’s most important to us is not so much resale value as just timelessness, and one thing I am so happy about is that that cold, gray Southern California-style is dying—the black-and-white stuff, the black steel. And what we’ve really seen is people taking a turn to warmer colors. Contemporary taupe is back, gray is gone.”
“People are shifting back to what makes us really special: the golden light, the great weather. We’re not trying to create New York here. So people’s priorities are changing, it’s less the shiny objects and more, I want this to be timeless. I want someone in 20 years to walk through and maybe we upgrade the appliances and technology and stuff, but we’re not tearing out floors, we’re not changing walls. We’re not boxing out with steel. What’s trendy now, it’s gonna be tacky in 10 years. I always want to go timeless. So go timeless with your materials. Go with natural materials as much as possible. The intent is not to make the magazine covers, it’s to create something that’s going to last forever. It’s going to be impervious to trends and styles and natural materials are at the top. So in terms of positive trends, I’ve always gravitated toward the warm, the natural, and luckily, that’s what people are valuing now.”