By Vickilyn Hussey
Courtesy Cave Creek Museum
One-day Only Home Tour of Six Stellar Residences &
The Legacy of Gerry Jones Featured Exhibit at the Museum Through May 2020
Jerry Jones At His Drawing Board. Courtesy Loralei Lazurek Images AZ © The Archive of Gerry Jones.
Carefree’s exciting architecture and sweeping vistas draw artists, designers, architects, visitors and residents who appreciate the creative integration of sculptural earth, rock, and striking desert terrain. Gerry Jones is the Desert Foothills’ distinguished architectural designer and builder who implemented the vision of Carefree’s founders, KT Palmer and Tom Darlington.
After serving in the Marines in World War II and Korea, Mr. Jones remained in China to study history and philosophy, martial arts, and jai alai. There, he observed that ancient Buddhist monasteries were tucked directly into the mountains. The topography had not been altered or leveled. When he began his career in design, he resolved to employ the terrain to its best advantage without destroying the natural mountain contours, just as the Buddhists had done centuries before.
Tour Signature Homes
Experience the innovation and drama of Gerry Jones’ architectural design by touring six of his signature homes on the Cave Creek Museum’s “The Gerry Jones Home Tour”! Or visit the Cave Creek Museum’s 2019- 2020 Featured Exhibit
Tickets for the “The Gerry Jones Home Tour” on Sunday, March 8, 2020, are $75 each and are only available in advance through the Cave Creek Museum. Participants will visit the homes via chauffeured buses in three shifts throughout the day, 9am-noon; noon to 3pm; and 3pm to 6pm. Please note that the residences are multi-level and are not ADA
Feature Museum Exhibit, Other Events
“The Legacy of Gerry Jones” which will be on display through the end of May 2020. Workshops and special events will be held at the Museum and other locations during January, February and March.
A Gerry Jones Lecture will be held at the new Carefree Town Council Chambers at 33 Easy Street, Carefree on Thursday, February 22, 2020, at 5:00pm. Admission is free.
The Home and Garden Boutique will be held at the Cave Creek Museum, one of the stops along The Gerry Jones Home Tour. For tickets and other details, please visit cavecreekmuseum.org or call the Museum at 480-488-2764.
DeMille Home_Carefree’s First Home.© The Archive of Gerry Jones
Tickets & Information
Cave Creek Museum
Location: 6140 E. Skyline Drive, Cave Creek, AZ 85331
Mailing address: P.O. Box 1, Cave Creek, AZ 85327-0001
(480) 488-2764
About Jerry Jones
“Do not seek to dominate nature with your buildings, but cooperate with it to achieve a harmony similar to that of natural creations.” – Gerry Jones
In 1957, on a handshake, Mr. Jones helped Mr. Palmer and Mr. Darlington realize their vision of a planned community in the foothills north of the Valley. A seasoned rock climber, he knew the land well, rough-platting 2200 acres of Carefree on foot. He laid out roads and lots by leading bulldozers across the land as he wove around native cacti, rocks, outcroppings, and trees.
Properties were planned with a mandate that no boulder would be displaced to accommodate a builder’s needs. Furthermore, Mr. Jones utilized existing rocks and boulders structurally as supports for the foundations of his buildings and interior features of the spaces he created. Based on his practice of building in harmony with nature, Mr. Jones wrote Carefree’s architectural guidelines. They became the foundation for Maricopa County’s building ordinance, which regulates hillside development, grading, and drainage to this day.
Over the years, Mr. Jones’ renowned work in Valley communities such as Camelback and Mummy Mountains, Pinnacle Peak, Paradise Valley, Phoenix, Scottsdale, Clearwater Hills, Carefree, and Cave Creek, led to his seventeen years as a instructor of extreme terrain architecture at Taliesin West’s Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture. His 1974 paper “Must We Destroy in Order to Build?” addressed the issues facing those who loved the natural drama and beauty of their Sonoran homes.
House-siting, materials palette, floor-level changes, and structural solutions are harmoniously integrated with the rock formations and physical features surrounding a Jones-designed residence. Mr. Jones’ own residence is nestled within the northeastern boulders of Black Mountain. For nearly fifty years, he has made Carefree his home. He continues to work from his studio overlooking the broad expanse of this beautiful region. His most recent house, in the Nighthawk subdivision on Black Mountain, was completed in 2018.
Mr. Jones perceives how the world around us isn’t separated by interior and exterior dichotomies. He creates timeless architecture with a livable affinity for the extreme terrain in Arizona’s wilderness. He brings bedrock into dwelling spaces and puts homeowners into the living desert.
This season-long celebration of Gerry Jones is supported by a grant from the Kemper and Ethel Marley Foundation.
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