Luxury for sale in new Deer Valley housing development

Deer Valley • Utah's premier luxury mountain resort is launching a multimillion-dollar housing development.

For the first time in its 32-year history, Stein Eriksen Lodge in Deer Valley has loaned its world-recognized name to a high-end, ski-centered residential project, which quietly opened a new sample home to tours earlier this month in the exclusive mountainside enclave of Silver Lake Village.

The initial phase of Stein Eriksen Residences offers wealthy customers a selection of top-flight homes and condominiums priced from $2 million to upwards of $7 million. The properties range from three to six bedrooms, spread over 2,000 to 6,000 square feet of space, designed in a sleek, modern and elegant style.

The lodge, named for Norwegian Olympic gold medalist and ski industry icon Stein Eriksen, is Utah's only five-star, five-diamond hotel and spa, with a devoted international clientele lured by its upscale European-style brand and fine restaurants.

"We demanded quality," Clare Jackson, real estate broker for Stein Eriksen Lodge, said of its partnership in the project. "We're very excited about the finishes and the look."

If fully built out, the six-acre alpine development will feature 16 houses and 38 condos, bounded by another two acres of green space and two reknowned ski runs and served by a lavish range of upscale amenities — all with some of Utah's most stunning mountain vistas in virtually every direction.

"It's the last great site in the Silver Lake area," said Dena Fleming, senior partner for Prudential Utah Real Estate.

The project is one of the first major offerings of luxury residential property in Park City and Deer Valley since the real estate crash, which hit sales of expensive Utah vacation homes particularly hard. That market lull and a shift in tastes toward more up-to-date architectural and design styles in mountain homes appears to have created pent-up demand, Fleming said.

"It's been extremely busy," the real estate agent said as she showed well-heeled prospective buyers through a four-story model home last week. "Everyone wants to see the latest and the greatest."

The project's developer, Los Angeles-based Regent Properties, held onto the land through some of the housing market's worst years, before deciding strength in the high-priced sector had returned, its executive vice president Daniel Gryczman said.

"It probably is one of the most accessible high-end ski towns in the country,'' he said.

Designed by the Salt Lake City firms Think Architecture and Denton House Design Studio and built by Magleby Construction, the homes have a contemporary, open design that departs from the rustic chateau elements more typical of many Utah ski lodges. Instead, the properties reflect a trend seen in newer private high-end residences in Deer Valley, as well as larger facilities in competing ski resorts such as Aspen, Vermont's Stowe or Whistler in British Columbia.

"A lot of projects are billed as `mountain contemporary' but you just have to look at this to know it really is," said Brett Kearney, project manager with Denton House.

Project architect John Shirley Jr. at Think said they sought to create an uncluttered, spa-like environment, with clean lines, warmer colors and exposed beams and timber columns.

"The inside of the home becomes much more of a retreat," Shirley said.

Though hardly mansion-like in size, the properties do highlight affluent living.

They feature wrap-around floor-to-ceiling windows, balconies, outdoor spas, gourmet kitchens, gas-burning fireplaces, private elevators, exercise rooms and heated ski boot racks, along with a wealth of other high-living fixtures in the development's common areas, such as spas, swimming pools, lobby areas and valet parking.

Stein Eriksen will provide full management, concierge, housekeeping and other luxury services to owners. It also will market the homes to interested lodge patrons, some of whom lodge real estate agent Jackson said were viewing the residences as a potential legacy investment for their kids and grandkids.

Gryczman, with Regent Properties, and other key players said Stein Eriksen Lodge's interest in the project, which began about a year ago, was key to moving forward.

"Their involvement brings it to a whole new level," Gryczman said. "They have a first-class luxury heritage that is a proven commodity."

tsemerad@sltrib.com

Twitter: @Tony_Semerad