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Cover of The Palm Springs School: Desert Modernism 1934-1975

The Palm Springs School: Desert Modernism 1934-1975

by Alan Hess

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Palm Springs is at the center of a unique tradition in architecture marked by invention and a sensitivity to local conditions that has resulted in design that exerts an influence far greater than the town’s small size. The book is the first to fully explore the wide ranging forms this architecture has taken, from houses to gas stations, hotels to airports, banks to restaurants and spas. Much more than a resort destination, Palm Springs has served as a laboratory of the Modern; here so much architectural innovation and design took form. From the steel-and-glass boxes of Richard Neutra to the earthy organic homes of John Lautner, and everything in between, the solutions of architects and designers—including notably William F. Cody, E.…

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"In an era of architectural monumentality, celebrity designs and urban gigantism, the Palm Springs School feels like a quiet manifesto in favor of scale, humanity, context. This volume offers a fresh look at the mid-century architectural experiment in California. Sometimes architecture’s power is in subtlety: in the way a flat roof reaches toward sky, or a window frames nothing but light. The deceptively relaxed houses, the interplay of indoor/outdoor, light and shadow, the vernacular modernism that speaks of desert realities and post-war optimism, all of these feel like a laboratory for a life lived well."
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