At a Keystone home aptly named Trail’s End, the landscape didn’t just influence the design; it called the shots. “When you have mountain views like this, they really do make a lot of the decisions for you,” says Adrienne Rynes, president of interior design at Frisco-based Collective Design. “We wanted the interiors to feel calm and quietly supportive of the scenery, not distract from it.”
Zane Levin, principal architect of Collective Architecture, and the interiors team at Collective Design worked as one, aligning materials and sightlines around those views. Flat and low-sloped roofs, warm spruce, and expansive glass were developed in tandem with the interior palette “so the home reads as a single, seamless vision rather than two disciplines stitched together,” Rynes explains.
The floor-to-ceiling windows and oversized sliding doors became the anchor for how each room was planned and experienced. With so much transparency, the design team focused on composing interiors that feel intentional without ever competing with what’s beyond the glass.
Seating arrangements float lightly within the rooms, circulation paths stay clear of window walls, and nothing interrupts the long visual pull to the peaks. “Furniture was kept low and light, so you never lose that connection to the outdoors, even when you’re sitting down,” Rynes says.
Material selections were equally restrained and landscape-driven. Soft greens echo the surrounding evergreens, stone grays mirror nearby rock outcroppings, and warm woods reflect the spruce used throughout the architecture. “Every texture inside the home ties back to something outside,” Rynes notes. Matte stone, wool, microsuede, and brushed metals layer in quiet depth without introducing reflective surfaces that might compete with the glass.
Because the home sits near the activity of River Run Village, the design also had to manage both exposure and retreat. Deep overhangs and strategically placed windows temper the bustle of the nearby ski base while still maintaining long mountain views. Interior layouts reinforce that balance by creating moments of enclosure without ever feeling disconnected from the outdoors.
“The clients were very clear: no heavy timber, no dark finishes,” Rynes says. That clarity opened the door to a lighter, more modern interpretation of mountain living, one defined by low-maintenance materials and subtle industrial accents that quietly reference Keystone’s mining history without leaning on overt Western motifs.
Throughout Trail’s End, the windows are not simply apertures; they are the primary design act. They frame the landscape as moving artwork, shape the interior experience hour by hour, and quietly reinforce the project’s guiding philosophy: when the outside is this powerful, the best design move is to let it lead.
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