One of the most extraordinary things about Salt Lake City is that you can land at its airport and then, in 20-30 minutes, you’re in the mountains looking at landscapes like this:

By my estimation, this makes it the most accessible big city and mountain town combination in North America.

Historically though, Salt Lake City hasn’t really been known for modern architecture. There is, of course, one glaring exception and that is the work of architect John Sugden.

Sugden was originally from Chicago, had trained under Mies van der Rohe, and is credited with bringing a similar kind of International Style to Utah.

The house pictured above is one of Sugden’s projects.

I’m not sure when it was originally built, but it was meticulously renovated by Brent Jespersen, and featured in Dwell magazine back in 2009. If you’d like to take a closer look, click here. (It is again being renovated right now.)

When I was researching who in Salt Lake City and Park City was building cool stuff, Brent’s name immediately came up. So I appreciate him taking the time to tour me through some of his projects this evening. Thank you, Brent.

What is now clear to me is that this whole not being known for modern architecture thing is quickly going away.