INSIDE THE PREDOCK "BOULDER HOUSE"
UNIQUE AND BEAUTIFUL, THE BOULDER HOUSE HAS AN UPDATED INTERIOR WHILE KEEPING ITS STORIED DESIGN
Feature Story
Antoine Predock, famed Albuquerque architect who has projects worldwide and is renowned locally for designing the Rio Grande Nature Center State Park Visitor’s Center, also created some of the area’s stunning homes.
One of his earlier works was one of the first homes built in North Sandia Heights. Snuggled against the side of the foothills somewhat north of the Tram terminal, this property has been on the market on and off for more than two years, and now has an offer pending.
The stunning, 4,828 square foot home known as the “Boulder House,” on 2.2 acres of craggy, evergreen-filled property, was built in 1976 and offered for $1 million. It was recently opened for a tour to University of New Mexico architecture students.
West-facing patios deliver sweeping, unblemished views across the Middle Rio Grande Valley, which alight with the setting sun, said seller Connie Iacuone.
“At night with the city lights and the sun going down and the lights coming up, oh my gosh,” she said.
When the sun peeks above the looming Sandias to the east, it too is a glorious sight that starts the day off right.
“I love to sit out here and drink my coffee and watch the sun come up,” Iacuone said.
Massive, wood-beam vigas radiate from the top of the living room fireplace, spreading like the spokes of a wagon wheel. Ten-foot-tall windows that stretch from floor to ceiling disappear into the framework to provide unobstructed access to the outdoors.
Antique, dark-red brick set in a herringbone pattern provide the flooring under which radiant heating keeps the abode cozy and comfortable.
An elegantly curving, oak-wood staircase leads to the sleeping quarters. The previous master bedroom has a deck that curls along the southern side of the house, providing 270-degree views.
During a renovation some years ago, also designed by Predock, an atrium-like space was covered and turned into an angular media room.
What had been an east-facing deck was covered to create a master suite, complete with four closets, including a walk-in accessed from both the bedroom and the oversized bathroom.
The remodeled gourmet kitchen was offset with dark-wood cabinets and lighter granite countertops.
The home offered a unique opportunity for husband and wife Realtors Eric Dopslaf and Deanna Dopslaf, owners of The Southwest Life real estate group underneath Keller Williams Realty, to market on a global scale.
“The key to getting anything sold now, especially in the luxury market, is exposure,” Deanna Dopslaf said. “We’ve got a lot of folks here (Albuquerque) whose marketing is fantastic for the local community. But this year we’ve had a huge uptick in $1 million or more homes. The two years prior to us taking the listing, this was the only million-dollar home for sale up here in the North Sandia Heights.”
The spike in high-dollar homes in the area, however, necessitated a different way of thinking about attracting a buy.
“All of sudden we hit a much larger number,” she said. “We have to compete for more of the market and we knew we weren’t going to be able to capture most of here it so we covered the local market and then we started expanding into the national and international market.”
Among the marketing plan was a developing a video showcasing the livability of the home.
“Families are really wanting to see themselves in the home so by putting actors, or in this case it was us, coming home having dinner, entertaining, whatever, it shows the house being lived in,” Dopslaf said. The lifestyle videos are a real, big, popular trend in the more upscale luxury markets like California and Florida; Atlanta is doing them a lot now also.”
Additionally, it certainly helped that the home had a certain provenance to it.
“We played on the fact on who was the designer,” she said. “We figured that with the designer being so internationally renowned — he’s building in Asia. He’s building in the Middle East. He’s building everywhere — that we obviously had a much bigger market in people being interested in having one of the original Antoine Predock designs.”
Marketing targets peppered social media with both the video and professional photographs. Part of the strategy was in keeping with the company’s own business philosophy, as well.
“Even without the attraction of the architect, our company name is Southwest Light, and our goal is to really promote what’s unique and fantastic about being in the southwest,’ Dopslaf said. “So we also do a lot of marketing with luxury homes and other homes, even entry level homes, about what it’s like to be here in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Santa Fe, all of those places. So it was kind of a two-pronged approach. Promoting the lifestyle of the southwest and we had the added kicker that we were able to promote that this was an Antoine Predock.”
The response came from around the world and even a little closer to home.
“We had to get the word out,” she said. “We got a lot of calls on it. We had calls on it from all over. One gentleman who called from somewhere in Asia. He was just curious but was going to be coming into town. There was a lot of interest the international marketplace.”
And for one person, it was walk down memory lane.
“Within a week of going live on this property, one of the young men who grew up in the house with as the original owners went into his LinkedIn account and low and behold, the house he grew up in was on his feed,” she said . “And he called me and said, ‘I just wanted to let you know, I grew up in that house and it really made my day being able to see the house I grew up in and what they did to the house.’ And he lives in California.”
The Iacuones have lived in the Boulder House for five years, making many changes along the way. But with children and grand children in Texas, they said it was time to sell.
“It’s been a labor of labor of love,” Connie Iacuone said. “I’m going to miss living here.”
"Even without the attraction of the architect, our company name is Southwest Light, and our goal is to really promote what’s unique and fantastic about being in the southwest.” deanna dopslaf the Southwest Life real estate group