Ethan Zagorec-Marks

With NMA Since

August 2025

My Life

Son of two brilliant artistic scientists and the oldest of three boys. I was raised in the Mountain West, in the foothills of the Wasatch Mountains. My upbringing, balanced between hard work and play, instilled a sense of stewardship over wherever home might be, showed the importance of community, and provided an environment that allowed for a modest degree of ferality and exploration.

My path, like everyone's, to Santa Barbara has not been a linear one. I have had the opportunity to work a variety of different jobs and have had many impactful teachers along the way. This diverse journey has contributed to a sense of humility, empathy, and adaptability that a curious person like me craves. A few notable experiences: I've cored apples and driven tractors at a cider mill, spent seasons teaching snowboarding and tennis and lifeguarding, fried fries and tossed pizzas, cleaned up after people, animals, and storms, aided in photoshoots and laid out magazines, constructed architectural models, designed and help build a storm shelter near the Arctic Circle, and now I am enjoying the opportunity to work with an inspiring team to help realize dream spaces for folks.

My Inspiration

Nature, loved ones, The Paris Review, Ram Dass, and a funky Gamay wine. 
Nature is a constant and dynamic source of inspiration for me, whether it is a landscape, the way sunlight rolls across a rocky face, an animal, or the scent of the desert after a rain. I am deeply moved and humbled by the natural world and do not subscribe to the idea that we as people are divorced from this world. Spending time outside has always brought me a sense of harmony, and this feeling of peace has rooted a deep respect for place and a sense of stewardship. This respect is not contingent on property value nor aesthetics; there is a lesson to be learned, a story to consider, and some magic to celebrate in every place, person, and project.

Favorite Memory

Awakening one Easter morning as a child to find that a rambunctious gaze of raccoons had devastated the easter egg hunt my parents had laid out in the yard. While simultaneously heartbreaking and hilarious for me and my brothers at the time, this was a valuable life lesson on non-attachment and the importance of protecting your chocolate stash.

Getting to experience the aurora borealis while cowboy camping on a job site at the tail end of Summer, on a nearly deserted island in the North Sea, thinking that I may freeze to death.

I remember feeling so very small and equanimous, sitting beneath still and silent pines during a snowstorm in the Wasatch while snowboarding with my brother and friends.

Driving along the Camino Cielo just before sundown, with a chile relleno burrito riding shotgun, on my way to one of those colorful UFO-shaped water towers.