This addition and renovation of a conventional 1950s Ranch-style house in the middle of a suburban lot into a minimalist backdrop for a lush desert landscape provides a contemporary alternative to suburban living in the desert. Maintaining the signifiers of the original house with gabled roofs and a front porch, the addition creates new room extensions through small courtyards that redefine the dwelling’s relationship to the landscape while maintaining privacy. The reframing of the landscape is furthered through green cladding in the form of fig vines that are manicured to follow the house's profile. These devices, in combination with large expanses of glass and a semi-attached covered patio that extends the house into the rear yard, challenge the conventional binary of house & landscape into an integrated notion of “housescape”.