The Andrew Baldwin Ranch Home is located some ten miles south of Sedona, Arizona, overlooking Oak Creek in that colorful section of Arizona land, where formations of rock castles domes and steeples create a fairy land. Whichever way you turn, either from the outside of the house on the grounds or from the interior’s wide windows, may be seen enchanting rock formations of variegated colors of gray, buff and red. These formations and colors change momentarily throughout the day, taking on the various hues and coloring of nature’s mood at the time. Even by moonlight the color is still there and mystery and romance has been added.
The Baldwin ranch home is located on a sloping piece of canyon side on a natural bench some 100 feet above Oak Creek and is of an architecture difficult to tag in any acknowledged style. There has been a blending of boulder stone taken from the bed of Oak Creek, mingled with the buff colored ledge sandstone, roughly shaped to form piers, fireplaces, and porches, while at the same time walls in some cases have been used of boards and battens, with brightly colored shutters and awnings typical of the country. Pergolas and posts in some cases are of rough unbarked cedar and the roof is of heavy handsplit cedar shakes, left in a natural color to weather to a warm buff-gray, toning in with the country side.
The plan of the house is in keeping with the exterior and interior views, creating an open livable homelike ranch house, occupied by people of culture and refinement, and consists of a large living room, two master bed rooms and baths, two kitchens, a sun-porch and maid’s room and bath. A stone lined entrance vestibule gives access down a few stone steps to the living room of ample proportions and homelike air, finished entirely in wood paneling with a touch of the exterior brought to the interior, as in the vestibule, which is of stone, and the treatment around the bookcases and fireplaces. There is no formal dining room in the plan.
The space at the end of the living room near the front forms an area devoted to dining. Opening off of the living room is a large sun porch facing southeast, giving a view across the colorful Oak Creek lined with cotton woods, and on into the distance above the canyon walls loom the buff and red striated rock castles and domes; truly a livable porch on which to sit and while away the time philosophizing on the shortness of man’s time in comparison with these ageless rocks. This sun porch is served from the winter kitchen which also serves the dining space at the end. In addition to the usual kitchen the house has a summer kitchen adjacent to the regular kitchen.
In addition to maid’s quarters and bath the house contains a master bedroom with fireplace, dressing room and bath and a guest room and bath. These rooms are finished in conventional manner, except that all ceilings are random width boards.
The home is heated with a vapor type heating system, with heating units concealed in recesses in the walls and under the windows.
A study of the pictures will indicate a judicious distribution of landscaping done by Mrs. Baldwin and which certainly is in harmony with the house. The location of the colorful surroundings does not require any extensive landscaping as the natural growth creates a setting for the house itself, and the use of stone in terraces and house walls and flagstone walks causes the house to appear to grow naturally from the earth itself.
The house was built during the year 1939, being designed by Lescher and Mahoney, architects of Phoenix.
handwritten note indicating article from Arizona Highways? June 1944?
