It was the fall of 2023 when a good customer of Chef Rafael Palomino’s Sonora restaurant shared that his wife had died. Rather than a funeral, she wanted a party overlooking the water at sunset.

The Saguaro Hotel Scottsdale is a boutique hotel on the edge of Old Town where the minutes catch, slow, and clog together in a heedless mass, where time clots like glue. That might because of the ...