The Wall Street Journal - 20.09.2019

Art, Opera and

Prime Ski Slopes

Santa Fe is becoming an unexpected draw for

skiers, boosting the local luxury-home market

T

he new ski getaway home of

Darcy Bingham and her hus-

band, Robert Bingham, isn’t

what you’d call rustic. It, in

fact, eschews nearly all normal

“mountain” architecture influences, like

faux log cabin, Swiss chalet or stone Mc-

Mansion. Though popular at many ski re-

sorts, those designs are effectively banned

here at Summit Powder Mountain, a

10,000-acre ski development in Eden, Utah,

about 60 miles north of Salt Lake City.

Instead, the Binghams’ 5,200-square-

foot, four-bedroom, five-bathroom home is

partly clad in Wyoming snow fence, and

looks more like a mashup of urban loft and

bunk house, with a floor of rough, paint-

speckled wood sourced from a 19th-century

factory, walls of windows in the open-plan

BYLEIGHKAMPING-CARDER

LINDSAY SALAZAR FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (5); ISTOCK (MOUNTAIN ICON)
Robert and Darcy Bingham, above right, and their home at Summit Powder Mountain, top left and right. The Utah resort, above left, is intended to be the embodiment of the Summit Series.

living area, and an alcove bed in the den

for impromptu guests on snowy nights. It

cost between $750 and $800 a square foot

to build, said Ms. Bingham.

“My husband and I had always talked

about how neat it would be to

have a mountain home, but we’d

never really found the right place

or the right community,” said Ms.

Bingham, 55, who is retired from

student affairs. Mr. Bingham, 52, is

a retired internet entrepreneur.

The home of Summit Powder

Mountain neighbors, Cristiana Fal-

cone-Sorrell and Martin Sorrell,

the founder and former chief exec-

utive of advertising giant WPP, is

equally genre-bending.

“It’s not crazy. On the other hand, it’s

not modest. It’s somewhere in between,”

Please turn to page M10

CONSTRUCTION

COSTS

$750-

$800

A FOOT

5,200 sq. ft.

4 bedrooms

5 bathrooms

Woke-Back Mountain

The owners of Summit Series, the global, consciousness-raising events

organization that counts Richard Branson and Reed Hastings as

members, hope to makeSummit Powder Mountain profitable with the

same ethos. Can it succeed once its inventory of acolytes runs out?

TOTAL ACRES IN

PROJECT (INCLUDING

SKI AREA)

10,000

COST OF RESORT

AND LAND

$40

MILLION

in 2013

HOTEL ROOMS

PERMITTED

1,500

RESIDENCES

PERMITTED

2,300

weather and a marketing drive to

increase awareness of its snowy

offerings is luring more skiers to

the area, even while the industry

as a whole is facing a variety of

challenges. New Mexico has eight

Alpine (downhill) and three Nor-

dic (cross-country) ski areas; the

closest to the capital is Ski Santa

Fe, 16 miles away, while Taos, a

world-class resort, is just two

hours away.

“You don’t feel like you are

walking around on the tundra,”

says Ben Abruzzo, area manager

Please turn to page M8

in the afternoon,” he says.

Santa Fe is better known for its

art, opera and Southwestern cui-

sine than for winter sports. But

the capital, with a population of

84,000, happens to be at an eleva-

tion of 7,199 feet. A combination

of a diverse culture, temperate

FROM LEFT: GABRIELLA MARKS FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL; DAVID CLIFFORD FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

40%

Percentage rise in

sales of houses

$2 million and above

in first eight months

of 2019

Kachina Peak at Taos, N.M. The state has eight Alpine (downhill) and three Nordic (cross-country) ski areas.

where he and his wife, Christine

Fisher, raised their kids.

The 48-year-old home builder

considered ski towns in Colorado,

but decided places like Vail, Aspen

and Park City, in Utah, seemed too

small and their winters too harsh.

Instead, last year

the Fishers

bought a four-

bedroom house

for $875,000 in

Santa Fe, N.M.,

where Mr. Fisher

skied 23 times in

one season on

powdery slopes

just a 20-minute

drive from home.

“People go to

meetings in the

morning and ski

SKIING WAS HIGH on the list
when Mark Fisher decided he was
ready for a lifestyle change that
included a move away from the
Chicago suburb of Oak Park,

BYNANCYKEATES

Mark and Christine Fisher bought this home in 2018.

$875,000

Stairs in the Binghams’ home have cut-out quotes from visitors.

MANSION

The Ice Coast

New Hampshire

ski-resort real

estate heats up.

M16

HOMES|MARKETS|PEOPLE|REDOS|SALES

MOUNTAIN & SKI HOMES ISSUE

Fjording

Ahead

Norwegians

embrace high-

altitude living. M4

WINTER IS COMING

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. Friday, September 20, 2019 |M1