Desert Utopia

Marmol Radziner and Associates, headed up by the photogenic and personable duo of Ron Radziner and Leo Marmol, has become the name in Los Angeles for painstaking adaptive restorations of mid-century-modern classics, and for contemporary new homes in the modern tradition. They are the architecture equivalent of the couture fashion designer who knows how to sew. Rare among architects, Marmol Radziner construct most of their residential designs, often on picturesque but difficult sites, to a high level of detail and quality—and they charge a premium.