A passionate cinephile, the Mexican movie executive knows the impact a dramatic setting can have on the senses. So when he heard that a sprawling villa perched on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Mexico was for sale, he snapped it up. Then he called the Paris-based Argentinean AD100 architect Luis Laplace to create a family and business retreat that would be theatrical as well as welcoming.
The two men have a long history of working together: Laplace designed the executive’s apartments in Paris and New York City in addition to a handsome 18th-century building he owns in the colonial town of Morelia, Mexico, which Laplace converted into a café/bookshop/pied-à-terre. “I like Luis’s sense of aesthetics and the way he blends beautiful furniture and textiles with local materials and crafts,” the executive says now. “We have similar visions.”
That may be. But when Laplace surveyed the property, nestled in the 1970s resort enclave of Costa Careyes, he decided the only way forward was to tear down the existing compound. The client was taken aback, to put it mildly. “I was first opposed,” he recalls. “Then I understood that we could arrive at a more personal and coherent project if we started with a blank canvas.” Or, as Laplace explained it, a home “for what you need today.”
custom sofas in a Pierre Frey fabric line the bamboo-canopied Palapa living room. Laplace designed the Parota-wood-and-lava-stone cocktail tables. René Martin lounge chairs; Karl Springer ottomans.
The requisites were Panavision large. As a major player in the film business, the client entertains lavishly and hosts VIP guests regularly. Therefore, there was a checklist of musts: plenty of guest rooms, a gym, an annex to house staff, and, of course, a state-of-the-art screening room. Overall, he wanted a home that would be “timeless and well integrated into the landscape of the Mexican Pacific coast.”
Laplace, an architect known for conceiving homes to showcase art—he’s a firm believer that form follows function—knew exactly how to fulfill that mandate: by designing enormous windows and sweeping open spaces to “focus on the spectacular nature and the sea. You have whales pass in front of the house, and sea turtles,” he says. “Usually, we put art in the center. But here, nature came first.”
For building materials, Laplace went as natural, and as regional, as possible, so that the home would harmonize with its surroundings. He used parota, an amber-hued tropical wood that withstands humidity, for tables and other furnishings; lava stone for tabletops; straw for cabinetry finishing; and bamboo and straw for the palapa, a spectacular outdoor living room with a soaring, cathedral-like thatched canopy. Traditionally, palapas are made of straw, with concrete columns. But the client wanted bamboo supports to give the space a lighter, lusher atmosphere. To erect it, Laplace brought in a bamboo specialist, architect Simón Vélez of Bogotá, Colombia.
An Alexander Calder tapestry hangs in the primary bedroom. Brass-and-bamboo armchair by Ubunji Kidokoro; grass-seated desk chair by George Nakashima woodworkers.
Laplace designed the terra-cotta pots and lava-stone fountain.
The interiors, centered around the owner’s contemporary furniture and art collection, evoke “something that is clearly Mexican, but with international flavor,” Laplace explains. Think midcentury Acapulco, when the Hollywood elite would jet down to holiday in grand style. Laplace carried on the palapa’s bamboo theme with mod wall sconces, curvy ceiling fixtures, and retro bamboo-handled flatware by Alain Saint-Joanis, which mercifully, unlike vintage versions, is dishwasher-safe.