Category: Palm Springs Modernism

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Indulge Your Passion for Desert Modern Homes at the 2010 Home Tour

 

Those with a passion for Desert modern architecture can indulge their senses at the Palm Springs Modern Heritage Fund’s 2010 Annual Home Tour (www.psmodernheritagefund.com/events.html) on Saturday, Nov. 6.   This year’s tour will cover residences in Rancho Mirage and Palm Springs with the rare opportunity to discover magnificent estates behind the gated hillside community of Thunderbird Heights, open for the very first time to tour guests.

The day-long, self driving tour includes eight homes and concludes with a poolside wine and cheese reception.  Cost is $125 and only a limited number of tickets will be available online for purchase at   www.psmodernheritagefund.com. Tour details will be provided to registrants only.

“Home tours like these are a great way to get acquainted with the superb collection of modern homes that we have here in Palm Springs,” said Ralph Haverkate.

“Palm Springs contains one of the largest concentrations of mid-century modern homes and buildings that you’ll find anywhere,” said Haverkate.  “The desert landscape here inspired such world-famous architects as Richard J. Neutra (www.neutrafoundation.com), Donald Wexler (www.moderndeserthome.com/index.php/architects.donald), Albert Frey, William F. Cody, Bill Krisel and Stewart E. Williams (www.psmodcom.com) who put their own stamp on mid-century modernist aesthetic.  It is so distinctive, in fact, that we now have a separate term for it  — desert modernism.”

Mid-century modern architecture, from approximately the 1940s through the 1960s, was partly fueled by the economic and housing boom of post World War II.  Desert modernism, a regional approach to International Style architecture, capitalized on the sunny skies and warm climate of the Palm Springs area, incorporating rocks, trees and other landscape features into the design.

A haven for captains of industry, Hollywood celebrities, and a burgeoning population of middle-class American families in the mid-20th century, Palm Springs was unique in place and time in that many talented, world renowned architects found their niche creating visionary, innovative civic buildings, custom and tract homes through both private investors and public commissions.

Characterized by open floor plans, extensive use of glass, steel and concrete, and seamless transitions from indoor to outdoor spaces, Palm Springs mid-century modern homes have been enjoying a revival of interest over the past decade or more.

“These day, buyers who have an eye for design are very much in the market for modern homes in Palm Springs,” said Haverkate  “With these homes now recognized for the historic and architectural treasures that they are, it’s no surprise that they are now among the most sought-after properties in the Greater Palm Springs area’s real estate market.”

The Heritage Fund was established as a 501 ( c ) 4 organization specifically to support local political candidates who share preservationists’ views about Palm Springs’ historic modern architectural heritage.  While tickets to the home tour are not tax deductible, funds go toward political endeavors to protect this heritage.

Pamela Bieri

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All About Mid-Century Modern

What is Mid-Century Modern?

Mid-Century modern is an architectural, interior and product design form that generally describes mid-20th century development in modern design, architecture and urban development from roughly 1933 to the late 1960s (www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mid-century-modern).

The term, coined by Cara Greenberg for her book, Mid-Century Modern: Furniture of the 1950s, published in 1983 by Random House, is now recognized by scholars and museums worldwide as a significant design movement.

What is Modernism?

Before World War II, architecture and furniture styles emphasized hand craftsmanship — ornate detail and traditional materials like dark, heavy woods.  However, decades earlier, the visual arts, painting and sculpture had already been influenced  by a movement called “modernism” with a visual emphasis on clean lines, contrast, elevation and innovative style and form.

French Impressionists, such as Matisse, Picasso, and symbolists in literature, Ezra Pound, T.S. Elliott, were among the early modernist artists and writers.

Modernism “questions the axioms of the previous age,” and is a cultural movement of changes in Western society beginning in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  It reflects  a trend of thought that human beings can create, improve and reshape the environment through practical experimentation, scientific knowledge and technology.   Along with new artistic and philosophical trends, social, political and economic were forces at work – industrialization (en.Wikipedia.org//wiki/Modernism).

Post War Life Style

Continue reading “All About Mid-Century Modern”

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Just Listed: A Walter White Architectural Gem in South Palm Desert

Welcome to Ralph Haverkate’s Real Estate Blog, Specializing in Mid-Century Modern Homes

Just Listed:  Architectural Gem in South Palm Desert by California Modern Inventor, Industrial Designer and Architect Walter White www.73271Buckboard.com

During the 1950s and 60s when many architects and developers first came to the desert, the area’s unique terrain, climate and rugged beauty provided exciting challenges as well as new vision for a generation of modernist thinkers.  Some gained fame and fortune in the desert; their many contributions are clearly visible in tract and custom developments, public and community projects throughout the area.

Others, such as California Modernist Walter S. White, created only a few precious gems that are still quietly tucked away in quality neighborhoods, just beginning to receive the recognition they deserve.

One of White’s unique homes, built in 1958 in the Silver Spur residential enclave at 73221 Buckboard Trail, overlooking Palm Desert, is now on the market.

Architectural block, glass walls that create a compelling indoor/outdoor relationship, interior floating walls and clerestory windows are a Walter White signature.  The home’s authentic mosaic bath tiles and pebble stone entry have been lovingly restored.  The newer pebble tech salt-water pool and spa are surrounded by spacious lawns, open patio areas and custom decorative block screen. Continue reading “Just Listed: A Walter White Architectural Gem in South Palm Desert”

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The Landmark Kaufmann House Still Makes News

This month’s Palm Springs Life’s home feature, “The Road to Fame and Fortune,” by Greg Archer (www.palmspringslife.com) opens with one of the area’s most famous homes, the Kaufmann House, a 1946 glass, steel and stone landmark designed by architect Richard Neutra.

The home has twice been at the vanguard of new movements in architecture:  First by helping to shape postwar Modernism and later, as a result of a painstaking and expensive restoration in the late 1990s, spurred a revival of interest in mid-20th century homes, according to a New York Times review by Edward Wyatt (www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/arts/design).

This house continues to make news as an important landmark.

One of the best-known icons by Viennese émigré Neutra, who moved to the United States in the 1920s, this unusual pin-wheel plan house was designed for Pittsburgh department store magnate Edgar J. Kaufmann.  It was the last domestic project by the architect, and arguably his most famous. Continue reading “The Landmark Kaufmann House Still Makes News”

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All About Alexander Homes

Plans are underway for the 10th Anniversary of the “Great Alexander Weekend” in Palm Springs, March 26-27, 2011. The Palm Springs Preservation Foundation (www.pspreservationfoundation.org ) is planning a full weekend of home tours, seminars, cocktail receptions and special tributes to one of Palm Springs’ most influential and innovative home builders.

The Great Alexander Weekends and PSPF’s tribute book, When Mod Went Mass, have garnered significant awareness of the Alexander-built tract homes by architect William Krisel, and helped leverage even more importance to the genre of Mid-Century Modern homes, commercial and public buildings which are prevalent throughout Palm Springs and the Coachella Valley.

From as early as the 1920s and through the 1970s, an impressive roster of talented architects have been captivated by Palm Springs:  R.M. Schindler, Richard Neutra, and Lloyd Wright (Frank Lloyd Wright’s son); young Swiss architect Albert Frey whose work profoundly influenced desert architecture; and regional modernists William F. Cody, Donald Wexler, E. Stewart Williams and Krisel. Continue reading “All About Alexander Homes”

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The Elrod House in Palm Springs is For Sale

Architect John Lautner’s Elrod House Now On the Market

Architect John Lautner’s iconic Arthur Elrod House (www.johnlautner.org) is back on the market with a  price tag of more than $13 million.

The late architect, renowned for his organic structures, composed  this amazing home carved into the rugged Southridge foothills overlooking  Palm Springs in 1968.  The house has been featured extensively in lifestyle, architecture and design magazine articles (www.palmspringslife.com/Palm-Springs-Life/February-2009/Daring-Design) and is best known  as the James Bond bachelor pad in Diamonds are Forever. It is one of three buildings in Palm Springs by Lautner:  Bob and Dolores Hope’s “space ship” domed home also on Southridge (1979) and the Desert Hot Springs Motel (1947).

The Elrod  house contains many Lautner hallmarks:  a difficult site, harsh environment, modest entrance that conceals soaring space, and rooms that conversely move between indoors and out.  The 8,901-square foot house possesses a daring Mid-Century design and breathtaking vistas. Continue reading “The Elrod House in Palm Springs is For Sale”

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Palm Springs Modern Architect Donald A. Wexler

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A Closer Look At Palm Springs Modern Architect Donald A. Wexler.

Palm Springs Modern is practically a genre in its own right:  Light, spacious steel-and-glass masterpieces  reflect a “golden era” of Mid-century desert architecture that ingeniously adapted industrial technology into now classic civic and residential buildings.

Celebrated  Palm Springs architect Donald Wexler’s  www.psmodcom.com contributions to Coachella Valley architecture are plentiful and exceptional.

While he may be best known for his neighborhood  of steel houses designed for the Alexander Construction Company in the early 1960s (http://www.psmodcom.com/buildings.html), most of Wexler’s works are found among public and commercial projects including one that first greets Palm Springs  air travelers – the Palm Springs International Airport.

Bold and striking with steel integrated  in every part of the house — walls, roof, fascia, trim — its beams, channels and columns were designed to fit together quickly and securely, to be erected in a matter of hours instead of days. Light weight but strong steel frame homes allowed more floor space and floor to ceiling windows to capture the breathtaking desert and mountain landscapes.  Many of Wexler’s homes featured a folded plate or zigzag roof line that today seems almost a signature “W” for his innovative design.

In an interview by Jack Levitan for CA-Modern Magazine (www.eichlernetwork.com ),  Wexler  said, “‘I saw steel as ideal for the desert.  In the desert, steel, concrete and glass are the only materials to build.  They’re inorganic and they don’t deteriorate in the extreme temperature we have.”

Back in the Mid-1950s and 60s, the steel homes were designed to be affordable (when steel was cheap), saving labor and materials, and  low maintenance — a garden hose the only maintenance tool required.

An advertising feature in Home Builder’s Journal, dated August 1962, (www.eichlernetwork.com) touted steel homes as being termite and fire-proof, longer lasting, acoustically superior, and snugly fitting to keep out dirt, insects, and hot or cold air with “consequent lower maintenance costs.”

This sounds hauntingly like today’s quest for energy efficiency, sustainability, low-maintenance and affordability. The famed architect also designed the Palm Springs Police Department and Jail, the Larson Justice Center in Indio,  the Merrill Lynch Building in Palm Springs, the original Palm Springs Spa Hotel’s Bath House (a joint venture with then partner Rick Harrison, architect William Cody and Pierre Koenig), the Desert Water Agency, El Rancho Vista Estates, Royal Hawaiian Estates (Palm Springs’ first residential historic district), Palm Springs Medical Clinic, Union 76 gas station, numerous schools and celebrity homes (www.ranker.com/list/donald-wexler-buildings-and-structures).

Wexler’s celebrity homes included the stunning Dinah Shore and Leff/Florsheim houses, actor Alan and Sue Ladd’s home, one that eventually became Ann and Kirk Douglas’, actress Andrea Leeds and her race-horse and Buick agency owner husband Bob Howard, and a project for Frank Sinatra.

“I felt houses were very personal .  You got very involved with people.  It’s different than doing  a public building or commercial job, ” said Wexler in the CA-Modern Magazine interview.

This past January, the Palm Springs Preservation Foundation (www.pspreservationfoundation.org) celebrated a three day Wexler Weekend, showcasing his work in honor of his 84th birthday.  The weekend kicked off with a showing of the film “Journeyman Architect: The  Life and Work of Donald Wexler”(available on YouTube)  by Design Onscreen (www.designonscreen.org).

The homes tour included 14 Wexler-designed tract home properties in El Rancho Vista Estates, Wexler’s original Palm Springs Home, the Krizman, Douglas and Shore residences.  Visitors toured the 2004 restored Leff/Florsheim house (built 1957) which was taken down to the slab and rebuilt using Wexler’s original blueprint while incorporating modern day conveniences and upgrades.

Some fascinating books on Wexler available through Palm Springs Preservation Foundation include the Wexler Tribute Journal, and Donald Wexler: Architect by Patrick McGrew (www.pspreservationfoundation.org).

More Palm Springs Modern events coming up:  Modernism Week, February 18-27, 2011 (www.modernismweek.com ) and the 10th Alexander Weekend, March 25-27, 2011, celebrating the Alexander tract homes’ architectural importance (www.pspreservationfoundation.org) .

Pamela Bieri

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The West Coast’s Largest Design Event

West Coast’s Largest Design Show Celebrates the Best Modern Projects, Products and People.

If you can’t get enough Mid-Century Modern, do not miss Dwell On Design (www.dwellondesign.com ), the West Coast’s largest design event, returning June 25-27 to the Los Angeles Convention Center.  Only a two-hour drive from Palm Springs.

Curated by the editors of Dwell Magazine, this three-day extravaganza features more than 200 brands on exhibition with design-forward exhibits, competitions, East and West side home tours, and over 80 presentations and panels by design industry  leaders and influencers. Continue reading “The West Coast’s Largest Design Event”

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High-End Home Sales

We don’t have a Case-Shiller Home Price Index for our area, so we make do with what we have.  We can’t simply track prices say above $1 Million, because that is a changing population – a house that sold for $1.5 M a couple of years ago may have sold recently for $950,000, and we would lose that change based on a price limit alone.  As a substitute, I use homes over 4,000 square feet in size.  The vast majority of these homes sell for above $1 Million.  I chose only 4 cities, as they are of similar age and have many similar homes.  The graph shows a growing number of sales.  The average sales price was around $1.8M for the first three months this year, but dropped to around $1.4M in April.  As prices drop, sales increase.    – Wayne Longman

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Home Prices – Will History Repeat Itself?

We see a lot of news about home prices, both good and bad.  Nobody can predict the future, but we might find clues about it in the past.  The Case-Shiller Home Price Index, captured the California home price collapse in 1990, as shown in the first chart – for high-tier Los Angeles homes.  Then the prices had increased by about a factor of two, just like our last bubble, as shown in the second chart.  The scale in the first chart has been expanded to show they were very similar bubbles, even to their relative size, shape, duration and the false recoveries in 1991 and 2007.  Maybe we can use the 1990’s experience to project our current recovery. 

If so, the blue bars show that it took seven years from the peak to just get to the point where prices began a true recovery.  Our price recovery may not start until 2013, and this is a worse economic situation than in the 1990’s. In between now and 2013 we may see still lower prices.  It is difficult to tell if the small peak we see today is a false recovery or the reaction to an overshoot in the drop, but from the last bubble it is not likely the beginning of recovery.  Again historically, that increase around 2013 will be at the rate of inflation, which in the long term is around 2.5% a year.  If so, this is relative price stability and isn’t bad news – volatility in home prices is the bad news because neither sellers or buyers know what to expect.  – Wayne Longman

Case-Shiller LA High Tier 1990 Bubble
Case-Shiller LA High Tier 1990 Bubble
LA Case-Shiller High Tier 2006 Bubble
LA Case-Shiller High Tier 2006 Bubble