Behind Adobe Walls: The Hidden Homes and Gardens of Santa Fe and Taos [Paperback]

Landt Dennis (Author), Lisl Dennis (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1997

At last, a beautiful, affordable style book that offers a rare insider's look at the highly personal and innovative aesthetic for which the Southwest is famed. Santa Fe residents Lisl and Landt Dennis have documented eighteen of the most unusual and awe-inspiring homes and gardens of the Santa Fe and Taos area. Meet the owners and designers, tour their homes, and witness the grand vision and loving detail they have devoted to their living spaces. With two hundred gorgeous full-color photographs, Behind Adobe Walls is an essential keepsake for the Southwestern native or visitor, and a visual inspiration for anyone who would like to create their own Santa Fe, wherever they may call home.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Once upon a time these New Mexico towns were rough-and-tumble settlements peopled by drifters and dreamers. Sante Fe and Taos are still very much a cultural rendezvous, but far removed from their humble beginnings; Sante Fe has lately become known as the Beverly Hills of the Southwestern U.S. Among its full-time residents are the Dennises, the husband and wife author-photographer team who host this tour of their neighbors' private homes. The owners and designers weigh in with their own words about creating these eclectic sanctuaries, making it a very personal tour.

Review

Neither desert nor rain forest, the high country of Santa Fe and Taos can be tamed, especially behind adobe walls. Rocky Mountain News

-- Rocky Mountain News, June 1997
Neither desert nor rain forest, the high country of Santa Fe and Taos can be tamed, especially behind adobe walls. Transplanted Easterners recognized this fact. After the 1920s, they began to surround their homes with adobe walls for privacy and for the added enjoyment of growing flower beds, which flourish in interior patios.

Protected from the elements and kept warm by the heat-retaining adobe, flowers do especially well in Santa Fe and Taos when the soil is properly prepared and adequately watered, often by drip irrigation. Grateful for warm days and cool nights, gardeners successfully grow irises, roses, blue mist spirea, yarrow, lavender, coreopsis, poppies, snapdragons, daisies, columbine, day lillies, flax, and peonies.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (April 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0811811646
• ISBN-13: 978-0811811644
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 9.6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #195,520 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Interior Design > Style
  • #51 in Books > Arts & Photography > Photography > Architectural

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

52 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Romantic look at SW interiors w/ little architectural design, February 10, 2000

By 

Curly Anacortes (Coal Creek, AZ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Behind Adobe Walls: The Hidden Homes and Gardens of Santa Fe and Taos (Paperback)

Cute colorful book. However, it is not what I envisioned from the reviews. It is all about decoration design studies and furnishings. If you want to see how to set a table, arrange items on a crowded shelf, hang antiques on a wall, then this book is for you. Unfortunately, this is NOT what I was looking for. Apparently, there is little in the way of comprehensive SW/pueblo style architectural and style books available. My search continues!

39 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars a big disappointment, January 27, 2001

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Behind Adobe Walls: The Hidden Homes and Gardens of Santa Fe and Taos (Paperback)

This book should probably be called "gated communities" rather than "hidden homes" - the homes photographed are the super-expensive vacation retreats of people who only live in the area periodically. These interiors are the work of professional designers, static "museum spaces" for the art collections of movie producers and ex-fashion models. The book is sadly lacking in the integrity and spirit of the people who actually live in the area, where a distinctive architectural and decorative style has evolved over thousands of years of human habitation.

It would be a pleasure to see a book about northern New Mexico houses that are designed, built, or lovingly restored by people who actually live in the area.

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good survey of contemporary ideas, September 6, 2000

By 

Jimmy A. Hendrix - See all my reviews

This review is from: Behind Adobe Walls: The Hidden Homes and Gardens of Santa Fe and Taos (Paperback)

I got this book so I could see more examples of the contemporary solutions in Southwest design. It has some good ideas, but most are more folk-art-based. Some of the photograhy is centered around the object more than the space, so it's not very effective if you are looking at it from an architectural point of view. It is a good start for ideas if you are looking to add some flavor to a design. Also realize that the book is not just gardens but interiors, too.

Most of this work is very elegant; some is kind of gaudy.