ANTIQUE BUTTERFLY TABLE

Palm Springs Weekend: The Architecture and Design of a Midcentury Oasis

This is the first book to reveal the eccentric treasure trove of commercial, civic, and domestic architecture that makes Palm Springs a true oasis of progressive design. Not merely regarded as a Hollywood playground, golf enclave, or retirement mecca, Palm Springs is also a bastion of idiosyncratic modernism that is unparalleled in the world. Creating stunning homes and an impressive array of other buildings in the middle of the desert, such masters as Albert Frey, Richard Neutra, John Lautner, R. M. Schindler, Donald Wexler, and Lloyd Wright exercised their creative potential there. Palm Springs Weekend explores everything from the grandiose, such as Neutra's Kaufmann house, to the more humble features of the city--motels, trailer homes, and the ubiquitous metal and concrete sunscreens that shade them. Filled with hundreds of archival and contemporary photographs, elevations, and vintage ephemera, Palm Springs Weekend reveals an inimitable city where modern design, Hollywood glamour, and the desolate drama of the desert coalesce.

Palm Springs Weekend could have been just a breezy look at the celebrity culture of this California desert playground. Instead, Alan Hess offers an authoritative yet refreshingly nondoctrinaire view of the various ways European and American architects--some famous, some not--adapted the canons of modernism to suit the desert climate, landscape, and lifestyle. With evocative vintage photographs and an engagingly retro design by Andrew Danish, this is one of the most enjoyable popular architecture books in years.
The story begins with "the panorama of brown rock... peppered with ever-changing shadows and the unexpected desert plants that turn this great natural wall into a tapestry of texture and color." Then came the wealthy industrialists and Hollywood royalty who wanted vacation homes and were more or--at least initially--less amenable to modern design. Car culture and casual living morphed the international style into new silhouettes and textures fit for a modern oasis.
Swiss emigre Albert Frey designed minimalist houses "like tents staked in the desert." Richard Neutra's famous Kaufmann House has polished glass walls, flat, floating roofs, and luxury finishes, while John Lautner's Elrod House--seen in the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever--is a futuristic concrete cave. Tract homes by William Krisel and Dan Palmer for the Alexander Company offered a mass-market modernist solution, with butterfly roofs and patterned concrete block walls crisply defined by the intense sun.
By the early '50s, local projects also included civic and commercial buildings. Memorable nonresidential projects range from William Cody's Huddle Springs restaurant, with its bold angled beams, canvas awnings, and open plan, to Victor Gruen's City National Bank, on which a sweeping curved roof reminiscent of Le Corbusier's Ronchamp chapel meets the desert opulence of gold filigree. --Cathy Curtis

I found this couch and coffee table about two years ago and wish I had the money and space for them. I kind of have a "thing" for cool coffee tables.

I almost snagged this. I love it and it was in excellent condition. Only 75 bucks.

In this charming film based on the popular L.Frank Baum novel, Dorothy and her dog Toto are caught in a tornado's path and somehow end up in the land of Oz. Here she encounters some memorable friends and foes in her journey to meet the Wizard of Oz who everyone says can help her return home and possibly grant her new friends their goals of a brain, heart and courage.

When it was released during Hollywood's golden year of 1939, The Wizard of Oz didn't start out as the perennial classic it has since become. The film did respectable business, but it wasn't until its debut on television that this family favorite saw its popularity soar. And while Oz's TV broadcasts are now controlled by media mogul Ted Turner (who owns the rights), the advent of home video has made this lively musical a mainstay in the staple diet of great American films. Young Dorothy Gale (Judy Garland), her dog, Toto, and her three companions on the yellow brick road to Oz--the Tin Man (Jack Haley), the Cowardly Lion (Bert Lahr), and the Scarecrow (Ray Bolger)--have become pop-culture icons and central figures in the legacy of fantasy for children. As the Wicked Witch who covets Dorothy's enchanted ruby slippers, Margaret Hamilton has had the singular honor of scaring the wits out of children for more than six decades. The film's still as fresh, frightening, and funny as it was when first released. It may take some liberal detours from the original story by L. Frank Baum, but it's loyal to the Baum legacy while charting its own course as a spectacular film. Shot in glorious Technicolor, befitting its dynamic production design (Munchkinland alone is a psychedelic explosion of color and decor), The Wizard of Oz may not appeal to every taste as the years go by, but it's required viewing for kids of all ages. --Jeff Shannon

Stills from The Wizard of Oz (click for larger image)