Joshua Tree National Park’s surreal desert landscape and star-studded night sky have a way of making travelers feel like they’ve stepped onto another planet. Now, a new hotel on the park’s doorstep offers a boutique stay as striking as the scenery itself. RESET Hotel opened this summer and is the area’s first new hotel construction in 15 years. Matador Network spoke with RESET’s co-founders, Adam Wininger and designer Benjamin Uyeda, to learn how their minimalist, Mars-inspired retreat is reshaping Joshua Tree’s hospitality landscape.
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RESET’s modular rooms are laid out like a futuristic village.
Photo: RESET Hotel
For years, visitors to Joshua Tree have stayed in motels, budget lodgings, Airbnb rentals, or camped in the park. What they haven’t had until now is a luxury stay designed to match the landscape. Wininger noticed a glaring gap in 2019 — despite Joshua Tree National Park drawing over three million visitors each year — there wasn’t a single boutique hotel to be found.
This realization coincided with a local affordable housing crisis, exacerbated by the short-term rental boom. Turning residential homes into vacation rentals was pricing out locals and straining the community. “Unless you are building an Airbnb ground up and adding new housing supply one-to-one, converting a house into a permanent Airbnb really hurts the housing supply,” Wininger tells Matador Network via email. Building a hotel on commercially zoned land on the other hand wouldn’t take away housing — an appealing solution to serve tourists without upsetting locals.
Photo: RESET Hotel
By teaming up with Benjamin Uyeda — an architectural designer known for his DIY modular projects — Wininger set out to build the kind of hotel the area was missing. The result is a stunning 65-room property spread across 180 acres of open desert, just five minutes from Joshua Tree’s North Entrance. Opening in July 2025, RESET is the area’s first new-build hotel in 15 years and serves as a passion project aimed at offering visitors a different way to stay in the high desert while easing pressure on the local housing market.
RESET looks nothing like a conventional hotel. Instead of a single main building with interior corridors, its free-standing rectangular cabins are set in orderly rows. Their corrugated silver siding and crisp geometry nod to co-founder Benjamin Uyeda’s background in shipping-container architecture. Uyeda tells Matador Network that from the start he wanted the design to feel like a modernist village, a place where guests would naturally spend more time outside and less time in front of screens.
That philosophy carries into each guest room. French doors open onto a private patio oriented toward the mountains, erasing the line between indoors and out. There are no interior hallways; raised walkways connect the cabins so every visitor has personal space. Inside, rooms are spare and earthy, with polished concrete floors, warm wood, and stone accents, and colors drawn from the surroundings. Thoughtful details include a solar lantern, in-room pour-over coffee setup, a Solo Stove firepit, and a cushioned patio daybed for stargazing. There’s no television, but a fold-down desk and fast Wi-Fi are there if needed. High-thread-count linens and Flamingo Estate bath products provide a touch of luxury without excess.
Cabins were prefabricated off-site, allowing construction with minimal disturbance to the fragile desert soil.
Photo: RESET Hotel
That seamless indoor–outdoor design also sets the stage for the hotel’s shared spaces. At the heart of the property is the Club House, a low-slung communal hub with a co-working area for quick email checks and a relaxed lounge bar. Outside, a 1,600-square-foot saltwater pool and hot Jacuzzi look out over open desert and mountain ridges. Wide platform loungers and shaded cabanas frame the scene, but the real spectacle comes late in the day. “This is the best time to watch the mountains,” Uyeda notes, describing how the jagged peaks “turn soft and orange as the sun sets.” Guests quickly learn to schedule poolside time at dusk, cocktail in hand, for the nightly light show.
Select suites include private soaking tubs placed to frame the park and mountains.
Photo: RESET Hotel
After dark, with virtually no light pollution, the Milky Way often stretches overhead on clear, moonless nights. The hotel offers guided telescope sessions and self-guided star maps through a partnership with Celestron, but many guests simply stretch out on their patio daybeds or gather at the communal fire pit to watch the night sky. Wininger puts it simply: “If you only have one night, make sure you’re at the pool for sunset, up for one of the sunrises, and sitting by a fire under the stars.”
Photo: RESET Hotel
RESET’s shared amenities bring a touch of luxury to the remote setting. An open-air spa features a five-person sauna and a cold-plunge tub for a bracing reset after a day of hiking, and morning yoga sessions help guests start the day. More than 100 acres of the property remain undeveloped, laced with self-guided trails and rotating outdoor art installations. A full-service restaurant is still to come — Split Rock Café & Bar is slated to open in early 2026 — but for now guests can enjoy a bistro-style breakfast, drinks and light bites at the bar, or venture into Twentynine Palms or nearby Joshua Tree for everything from cafés to classic roadhouse barbecue.
RESET sits about a five-minute drive from Joshua Tree National Park’s North Entrance and roughly two and a half hours by car from Los Angeles. Palm Springs International Airport is the closest major airport, about an hour away, and a rental car is essential for reaching the property and exploring the park. Nightly rates start around $250.
