PROfiles

>>> meet the designers behind projects featured in this issue

Sarah Carr
Donna Figg, ASID, NEWH

When interior designers Donna Figg and Sarah Carr of Slifer Designs in Edwards, Colorado teamed up to work on The Arrabelle at Vail Square, a luxurious boutique hotel in Colorado's mountain resort village, they knew the project would be intricate and multifaceted. "It's a high-end property," says Figg, Slifer Design's director of hospitality, "with amenities such as butlers and a ski nanny, but the look had to be elegant and cohesive." Agrees Carr, the project manager, "There were so many different components to the project — the hotel, the spa, the restaurant. We wanted to get it right." But for Figg, who's been in hospitality design since 1990, and Carr, who graduated from the University of Oklahoma, moved and started her career with Slifer in the course of one weekend, a challenging hotel project is all part of the job. "That's what we specialize in here at Slifer — mountain resort design," says Figg of the company, which was founded in 1984 by designer Beth Slifer. "We've found our niche." The Arrabelle is featured in this issue.

Deniece Duscheone, LEED AP

That architectural and interior designer Deniece Duscheone's first hospitality project would be the renovation of San Diego's historic U.S. Grant Hotel seems to have been written in the stars. She grew up in nearby Coronado, received her bachelor's in architecture from San Diego's NewSchool of Architecture and Design and founded her design firm S.K.I.N. (Sustainable Kinetic Integrated Nature) with partner Christopher Maresca in the city in 2004. "The U.S. Grant figures prominently in my life," says Duscheone. "My mother had her prom there, and when I was little, my grandmother and I would take the ferry from Coronado and walk up Broadway to have afternoon tea at the Grant. Having that connection and being a native, it was an honor to do the project." Duscheone, who now has several other hospitality projects in the works, tackled the massive Grant project — featured in this issue — and finished it in a year. "I never slept," she explains. "I just did it. But when it was finished, I happened to be walking across the street at Horton Plaza and turned around to glance at the hotel. I froze. I realized the enormity of it all and got a little emotional. My assistant told me not to lose it there, in public."

Caren Roddy, AIA, LEED AP
Mark Roddy, AIA, LEED AP

It's often said that design professionals' most difficult challenge is designing and building their own homes — especially if both spouses are involved. But for the most part, architects Caren and Mark Roddy were on the same page when it came to taking an edgy, prefab approach to expanding their downtown Phoenix home. The two are steeped in modernism. Mark is a design principal at SmithGroup Phoenix, a firm known for its award-winning commercial, educational and urban projects. Caren worked for Swaim Associates, a Tucson architecture practice, before becoming a project manager with the Phoenix office of Gilbane Building Company, a construction-management firm specializing in educational, healthcare and government work. With their LEED accreditation, the couple was also interested in taking a greener approach to their home addition. Nonetheless, Caren reports, the two did have slightly different styles when it came to the actual construction, due in large part to another addition — their son — who arrived just before the home addition's completion date. "Mark was still being detail oriented," says Caren. "With the pregnancy and the baby, I got to the point where I just wanted it done." Their house is this issue's Residential Walk-Through.