Community: Optima McDowell Mountain Village

Mega projects will dominate 2025

Jan. 5—If you’re driving around Scottsdale this first week of 2025, take a mental picture of the landscape.

The scene is going to look very different by the end of the year.

Dozens of projects of varying scales are in process or prepping to change the view around the city.

Here are the top 25 Scottsdale construction projects to watch in 2025:

Optima McDowell Mountain Village

Unlike several of its prominent neighbors along “development row,” this 1,300-unit apartment complex is moving full-speed ahead.

And, unlike massive projects bankrolled by Californians, Texans and other out-of-towners, this one — though the glammy apartments are far from rustic — has a certain “hometown vibe.”

The North Scottsdale face changer was imagined by David C. Hovey and David Hovey Jr., the superstar father-son Scottsdale architects.

Construction crews have been excavating, laying foundations and putting beams in place for the last year on this multi-building behemoth — the largest apartment complex in Scottsdale history.

The new “environmentally friendly neighborhood” promises it “will also be a destination for Scottsdale residents with 36,000 square feet of commercial and retail offerings, 75% open space on grade level and 100% underground parking. The property will feature a bicycle/pedestrian path.”

Optima is working on the first luxurious apartment building — they all will have rooftop pools — on former desert land just south of the Loop 101 on Scottsdale Road.

The first apartments should be ready-to-rent by fall.

 

Read more on Yahoo News

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Sales begin for 1st Optima McDowell Mountain luxury condo tower in Scottsdale

PHOENIX — Sales have begun at the first luxury condo tower owned by Optima McDowell Mountain in Scottsdale, a press release announced on May 14.

The condo complex valued at $1 billion revealed 196 residential units that range from $600,000 to close to $1.4 million for prospective buyers. The individual units, which come in one-, two- or three-bedroom segments, are as small as 728 square feet and as large as 2,204 square feet.

More than 60% of early condo reservations have been for “custom combination homes,” a purchase of two to three adjacent units, according to the release.

Optima McDowell Mountain is located at Scottsdale Road and the Pima Loop 101 Freeway on 22 acres of land which will eventually contain six towers (all eight stories high). Its expected completion date is summer 2027.

Of the property, 1.5 acres of each tower will be dedicated to “resort-caliber amenities” including an Olympic-length pool, a track, an outdoor spa, a sauna, multiple firepits, a fitness center and more.

Within the roughly 16 acres of open space in between the six towers will be 36,000 square feet of restaurants and retail shops. The inner-circle space is designed to be an “oasis.”

David Hovey, president of Optima, said it’s the first time in four years the company has offered “for-sale residences” in the Grand Canyon State.

“We’re bringing everything we’ve learned over the past four decades into this new community,” Hovey said in the release. “Optima McDowell Mountain reflects our ongoing commitment to thoughtful design and quality living, and it represents the next chapter in our legacy.”

 

Read more on KTAR

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Customizable, contemporary and chic: Optima McDowell Mountain

Anyone looking for a break from gray skies, drizzles and downpours might be considering an escape to a drier climate. Optima McDowell Mountain
in Scottsdale promises to be that sanctuary from fog and mist.

Here, floor-to-ceiling windows frame views of the desert landscape and flexible layouts allow buyers to customize elements of their condos.

The state-of-the-art, all-inclusive residences will be built with environmentally sustainable materials. When finished, developers expect Optima McDowell Mountain to provide an attractive destination for entertaining, dining and outdoor recreation.

Award-winning architects David C. Hovey and David Hovey, Jr. collaborated on the design that will feature six buildings with vertical gardens and
rooftop terraces. The buildings will provide panoramic views of McDowell Mountains to the east, evening sunsets, Camelback Mountain to the south.

 

Read more on The San Francisco Chronicle

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Optima: LEEDing the Way in Sustainability and Conservation

Optima, an award-winning real estate development firm, recently announced plans to move ahead with its next Arizona residential development, Optima McDowell Mountain Village, in North Scottsdale after receiving the city’s approval for the $1-billion sustainable mixed-use community. 

Breaking ground spring/summer 2023, the 22-acre site, located on the southeast corner of Scottsdale Road and the Loop 101 Freeway, is comprised of six concrete-framed, eight-story buildings that will include 1,330 luxury residences and 36,000 square feet of commercial and retail space. The development will be a mix of condominiums and apartments.

And it premiers a couple of special features.

Rainwater Harvesting and Water Conservation

Optima McDowell Mountain Village will be the largest private rainwater harvesting site in the United States, with an approximately 210,000-gallon storm water tank in a concrete vault at the lower level of the site. The tank will recapture water to repurpose for irrigation. Based on data from two other Optima communities in Scottsdale, the residences within the community are expected to use half as much water as the average Scottsdale multifamily residence and a quarter as much water as the average Scottsdale single-family home. Optima is also providing the City of Scottsdale with 2,750 acre-feet of water that will be deposited into the Scottsdale water system.

New Green Standards

The community will be the first project in Arizona to be built under both the new International Energy Conservation Code (IECC), which provides for an additional 9% energy savings over the previous code, and International Green Construction Code (IgCC). Both codes establish guidelines to create energy-efficient and sustainable buildings.

A few highlights of the sustainable features include 75% open space that will be a combination of artificial turf, xeriscape landscaping and native plants; high-performance mechanical systems, solar panels; 100% underground parking to mitigate the heat-island effect, and Optima’s signature vertical landscape system. The underground parking reduces the heat island effect by 9 to 12 degrees. The vertical landscaping system, with its self-containing irrigation and drainage, will enable a palette of vibrantly colored plants at the edge of each floor to grow both up and over the building. The integration of enhancements to the vertical landscape and architectural shading systems protects homes from the sun and creates additional privacy, while filtering the air and lowering ambient temperature.

Designed in partnership with David Hovey Sr., FAIA, the six buildings feature undulating landscaped facades that echo the shapes of the McDowell Mountains with elevations that will create depth, shadow and texture. The outdoor terraces provided for every residence will be edged with trailing native plants cascading down the building and the colors of the desert will be incorporated throughout the community with bronze glass, railings and planters. Glass-enclosed, 15-foot-high ground-floor levels will feel utterly transparent.

Amenity Rich

Each of the six buildings will contain a variety of state-of-the-art, health-based and resort-style amenities that include a rooftop deck with a 50-meter Olympic-length swimming pool; a sauna, spa and cold plunge; a running track that will follow the perimeter of the roof; and more, along with spectacular views of the surrounding desert landscape and mountains. The ground-floor will feature spacious, well-appointed lobbies; a fitness center and yoga studio; a residents’ club with game room and theater; an outdoor pickleball arena; indoor and outdoor kids’ play spaces; a dog park and pet spa; a business center and conference room; and more.

The convenient location is just a five-minute drive to the shopping, dining and entertainment destinations of Scottsdale Quarter and Kierland Commons, while the proximity to major highways and freeways will provide residents with easy access to the surrounding Valley. In addition, the development will feature a bicycle and pedestrian path around the perimeter of the development that will connect to the bicycle and multi-use paths of the City of Scottsdale Bicycle Master Plan.

Optima McDowell Mountain Village will be Optima’s most sustainable project to-date and will utilize the kind of architectural detail that characterizes Optima’s Arizona projects, representing the next evolution of Optima’s design and construction.   

David Hovey Jr., AIA, is president and COO of Optima, Inc. and Optima-related entities. He oversees all company entities and business units, including development, architecture, construction, land acquisition, entitlements, corporate finance, sales and marketing, investor relations and asset management.

Did You Know: Optima McDowell Mountain Village will be the largest private rainwater harvesting site in the United States, with an approximately 210,000-gallon storm water tank in a concrete vault at the lower level of the site.

 

Read more on In Business

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Masters of the Southwest: A Father-Son Duo is Redefining Sustainable Desert Living

On a sunny winter day, residents of Optima Kierland are pursuing their morning rituals—walking the dog, working out in the fitness room, running on a track around the rooftop pool, powering up a Zoom call in the lounge, heading to the underground garage for the commute to work. But the 1,000-unit condo and rental complex, spread across five towers, is not your typical brown-box-and-a-balcony multifamily project so prevalent around the Valley. Instead, it is a sustainable, architectural tour-de-force, balancing concrete and glass, shade and sunlight, voids and cubic forms, all cooled with lush plantings that defy boundaries between outside and in.

The project is one of the latest achievements by father-and-son architects David Hovey Sr. and David Hovey Jr., who, along with other family members, run Optima, headquartered in Scottsdale and Chicago. Known for their edgy, architecturally striking designs of multifamily complexes and innovative construction techniques and materials, the Hoveys—and their company—have found the secret sauce to success. Optima is a soup-to-nuts company that develops, designs, builds and manages projects, overseeing everything from site selection to specifying kitchen sink faucets.

“I’ve been a fan of the Hoveys’ architecture for a long time,” says architect Anthony Floyd, who heads Scottsdale’s green building program and has worked with the Hoveys on sustainability strategies for several of their projects. “They’ve changed how we view multifamily housing here. What they create is unlike what we’ve seen in Arizona—or even the world.”

The history of this modernist dynasty began with Hovey Sr. Born in New Zealand to a Kiwi mother and a U.S. Marine father, he moved with his family to Chicago when he was 15 years old. “Chicago is the foremost city in the world for modern architecture,” Hovey Sr. says. “Being there sparked my interest in architecture.”

Hovey Sr. enrolled in the Illinois Institute of Technology, where Mies van der Rohe had served as dean and shaped the school’s modernist bent. “Mies was no longer at IIT when I studied there,” he remembers, “but some of us went to his house one night and didn’t leave until 4 a.m. He lived in an old brick apartment—not one of his designs—because he didn’t want to be constantly accosted by clients.”

During college, Hovey Sr. worked as an assistant to the curator of contemporary art at the Art Institute of Chicago, igniting his love of modern art and inspiring his later work in metal sculpture. His first job out of school was with a small firm, but, wanting to experience a larger office, Hovey Sr. signed on with noted Chicago architect Helmut Jahn, working there for four years during the 1970s.  

“My son and I are contemporary architects. We are interested in the design, materials and technologies of the 21st century. We’re not interested in allusions to the past.”

David Hovey Sr., FAIA, architect

But there was always an itch to do his own thing. “My IIT professor, Arthur Takeuchi, always said that an architect was the low man on the totem pole when it came to projects,” Hovey Sr. recalls. “He said the best outcome was to be not only the designer but also the developer and client.”

Heeding those words, Hovey Sr. launched Optima in suburban Chicago in 1978, along with his wife, Eileen Sheehan Hovey, who handled the real estate component of their projects. Before long, they were specializing in design-driven multifamily complexes around the city and, later, joined by their children, Tara Hovey, who handles financial strategies for the company, and David Jr., who earned his master’s in architecture at his father’s alma mater and now serves as CEO.

Frequent winter visitors to Scottsdale, the family opened a second Optima office in the desert in the early 2000s, sensing a market that was open to innovative modernist housing. By then, Hovey Jr. was helping push forward Optima’s shape-shifting experimentations with design, materials and construction methods. “When I was working as a construction superintendent on our job sites,” says Hovey Jr., “I observed inefficiencies between architecture and construction that could be improved by prefabrication.”

Though they became known for apartments and condos, the father and son have long experimented with techniques and approaches by building single-family spec homes, completing several over the years in North Scottsdale. “We had to find a new language for architecture here in Arizona,” Hovey Sr. says. “Studying Frank Lloyd Wright’s shelters, we learned to design optimum structures in the desert, ones that celebrated the indoor-outdoor relationship and incorporated sustainable features, such as solar power and passive cooling. We took what we learned from these spec homes and translated that into our multifamily work.”

After completing their first Arizona project, the Biltmore Optima, the Hoveys wanted to include landscaped roofs and terraces for the next site, Optima Camelview. Hovey Jr. worked with ASU to study desert plants in terrace- and rooflike beds at a site in Glendale. “We looked at about 150 kinds of plants and trees,” Hovey Jr. notes. “We learned which survived in extreme sun or shaded spots and which didn’t.”

Optima Camelview, a condominium project, won accolades and awards for its—literal—green design of lushly landscaped terraces, as well as other sustainable strategies, such as shaded glass walls, underground parking and public open space. Optima Sonoran Village, rental apartments in downtown Scottsdale, followed, expanding on the design theme, as did the recently completed Optima Kierland. Under construction now is Optima McDowell Mountain, which will be a six-tower development of rental apartments and condos, mixing in street-level retail and even more amenities and green elements, such as rainwater harvesting, than the previous projects. 

As the Hoveys moved forward with projects, they developed relationships with core groups of craftspeople, such as Jerry Barnier, founder of Suntec Concrete. “We started working together about 15 years ago,” says Barnier, “and we found that the Hoveys are very receptive to pushing the design forward efficiently. They understand what works and what doesn’t when it comes to construction. They push everyone to do their best work.”

Despite recent pushback about high-density development in some parts of the Valley, the Hoveys are secure in their place in the desert’s urban landscape. “Having density and height on a site allows us to create open space that’s accessible to the public—and not just our building residents,” Hovey Sr. points out. “It also gives us room to have setbacks that are landscaped. Our McDowell Mountain project is planned around a central park open to everyone.”

Always looking for future possibilities, the father and son prefer to concentrate on one or two projects at a time. “Each development we do is a progression, a journey of how we envision people living in the 21st century.”

Optima Sonoran Village in downtown Scottsdale has five residential towers set around landscaped courtyards with views of Camelback Mountain. Each apartment has plant-fringed balconies that add to the greenscape.
A stint working at The Art Institute of Chicago sparked David Hovey Sr.’s love of contemporary art and his own work as a sculptor, including “Kiwi,” which graces an Optima project in Chicago.
Optima Kierland Center, the Hoveys’ most recent project, is a series of condo and  apartment dwellings offering luxe amenities, including cooling landscaping, rooftop pools and running tracks, a golf simulator and a dog “spa” for washing pooches.
In the heart of the Camelback Corridor, Biltmore Towers was the Hoveys’ first foray into the Arizona multifamily market and featured unique design elements, such as recessed balconies, red trellises and orange sunscreens.
Optima Verdana in suburban Chicago includes retail offerings at street level and apartments above.
The Camelview Village condo development put Optima on the local design radar, with innovations such as landscaped balconies and open space, as well as an edgy, modernist design. According to architect and Scottsdale’s green building head, Anthony Floyd, both David Hovey Sr. and David Hovey Jr. lived in units on site. “That’s what I call proof of concept,” says Floyd. “They could see what worked—and what didn’t.”
In downtown Chicago, Optima Signature and Chicago Center includes 42- and 57-story towers, with forms, details and colors inspired by Russian painter Kazimir Malevich and American artist Donald Judd.
Also in Chicago, the Lakeview project features indoor open space as a response to the climate.
“Curves and Voids,” a sculpture by David Hovey Sr., graces the gardens at Sonoran Village.

“Our single-family homes are experimental. They are our ‘Case Study’ projects from which we take ideas and apply them to our multifamily work.”

—David Hovey Sr., architect and Optima founder

Read more on Phoenix Home + Garden

Inside Optima McDowell Mountain, a $1 Billion Biophilic Community Redefining Luxury Living in North Scottsdale

A new chapter in Arizona real estate is officially underway. Optima McDowell Mountain, a $1 billion mixed-use community rising across 22 acres in North Scottsdale, has welcomed its first residents with the completion of Tower 7220. The milestone marks the initial phase of a six-building vision that places design, sustainability, and livability at the center of contemporary desert living.

Tower 7220 residential building at Optima McDowell Mountain at dusk
Tower 7220 exterior at sunset at Optima McDowell Mountain in ScottsdalePhoto Courtesy of Optima McDowell Mountain

When fully realized, Optima McDowell Mountain will comprise 1,330 residences across six architecturally striking eight-story buildings. For now, Tower 7220 stands as the project’s first expression, offering a preview of what is set to become one of the most ambitious luxury residential developments in the United States.

Outdoor recreation court at Optima McDowell Mountain community
Golf simulator and lounge inside Optima McDowell Mountain luxury residences
Fitness center with turf and equipment at Optima McDowell Mountain

Tower 7220 Sets the Residential Standard

Tower 7220 introduces 210 rental residences ranging from studios to three-bedroom floorplans, with monthly pricing starting at $2,900 and extending beyond $10,000. Each residence reflects Optima’s signature biophilic design philosophy, a design approach that integrates natural elements into the built environment to support well-being and connection to place.

Floor-to-ceiling windows and 9- and 10-foot ceilings bring in abundant natural light, while private terraces wrapped in lush native plantings soften the building’s modern lines and extend living spaces outdoors. Interiors are designed for both function and refinement, featuring smart-home technology, expansive walk-in and millwork closets with built-ins, and sun-screening roller shades, including blackout options in bedrooms.

Contemporary kitchen interior at Optima McDowell Mountain Tower 7220
Modern resident lounge with pool table, bar seating, and floor-to-ceiling glass
Bright living room with modern finishes at Optima McDowell Mountain

Kitchens are outfitted with eased-edge granite countertops, soft-close cabinetry, and stainless-steel appliances with induction cooktops. Select layouts include wine refrigerators and utility sinks. Bathrooms elevate everyday routines with frameless glass showers, large-format tile, and dual vanities in two- and three-bedroom homes, along with select features such as deep soaking tubs, seated vanities, and private water closets.

A Community Built Around Open Space and Sustainability

Optima McDowell Mountain is defined as much by what surrounds the buildings as by the residences themselves. Seventy-five percent of the community’s grounds are dedicated to open space, creating a sense of scale and breathing room rarely found in urban-style developments. The project also incorporates the largest private rainwater harvesting system in the United States, underscoring its long-term commitment to responsible resource management in a desert environment.

A pioneering vertical landscape system further transforms the development into a living extension of the surrounding terrain, reinforcing Optima’s vision of a modern desert oasis that evolves with its environment rather than competing with it.

Contemporary residential lobby with floor-to-ceiling glass and landscaped courtyard views
The main lobby blends modern architecture with greenery and sculptural furnishingsPhoto Courtesy of Optima McDowell Mountain

Resort-Style Amenities With Everyday Appeal

Residents of Tower 7220 enjoy access to approximately 1.5 acres of amenity space designed to support both active and social lifestyles. Highlights include a rooftop deck anchored by a 50-meter Olympic-length pool, along with a running track that will follow the perimeter of the roof. Additional amenities include a state-of-the-art fitness center, indoor and outdoor pickleball courts, an outdoor putting and chipping area, and a range of additional lifestyle-focused spaces designed for daily use rather than occasional indulgence.

As future buildings come online, each will feature its own dedicated amenity offerings, reinforcing the community’s all-inclusive approach to luxury living.

Outdoor pickleball court surrounded by glass walls and planted balconies at Optima McDowell Mountain
Outdoor amenity terrace with fire pits, seating, and biophilic balconies at Optima McDowell Mountain
Indoor basketball court with glass walls and fitness center at Optima McDowell Mountain

Looking Ahead at a Multi-Phase Vision

Tower 7220 represents just the beginning. Optima McDowell Mountain’s first phase includes this initial apartment tower debuting in fall 2025, with a condominium tower scheduled to arrive in summer 2027. Together, the six-building development is poised to reshape expectations around large-scale residential communities in Arizona, blending modern architecture with environmental sensitivity and long-term livability.

 

Read more on Resident

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