Casa Ayehualco Miranda

"Over the course of 40 years, Mexican architect Diego Villaseñor and his wife, landscape architect Ana María Maldonado, built this five-bedroom house on the outskirts of this town 90 minutes south of Mexico City. Leaning into building materials like locally sourced stone, adobe, and indigenous hardwood, the structure references the surrounding tropical and temperate forests and the craggy Sierra de Ajusco-Chichinauhtzin range nearby. Casa Ayehualco's architecture creates moments that invite deep connection with the landscape, like a cool, dimly lit stone passageway ending in a courtyard that perfectly frames the nearby peaks. The artwork has a similarly elements-first ethos: A terra-cotta tunic by Xawery Wolski hangs in the kitchen, while traditional folk-art figurines—in this case little ceramic reinas, or queens, with scenes of rural life exquisitely depicted on their dresses—decorate the living room."