FEATURES

TAKING DESIGN CUES FROM CULTURES ALL OVER THE GLOBE, TWO ARTISTS BRING THEIR JOURNEYS HOME

A tall, Sioux-style teepee marks the entrance to Beth O'Donnell and Alejandro Oviedo's property in the East Hampton woods. The scrappy trees give way to Provençal-style gardens that surround a building resembling a farmhouse. When the brightly painted coral front door opens, visitors know they've entered another world.

On their first visit to the Hamptons several summers ago, the couple immediately connected with the light, says O'Donnell, a photographer and co-founder of Miraval spa in Arizona. "When I walked into this house, it felt serene," she says. "It combined all of my sensibilities from my childhood spent on a lake in the woods of Wisconsin, my summers in Provence taking cooking classes, the development of Miraval in the desert and my current photographic work in East Africa." They closed on the house in February 2005, renovated, redecorated and moved in four months later.

O'Donnell and Oviedo, a sound engineer, wanted their home to serve as both an entertaining space for a houseful of guests and a serene retreat for two.