A Self-Guided Mid-Century Modern Architecture Tour of Palm Springs

Palm Springs became the capital of mid-century modernism because Hollywood money, desert light, and architects like Richard Neutra, Albert Frey, William Krisel, and Donald Wexler collided here between the 1940s and 1970s. The result is a city where gas stations and banks are landmarks. You do not need a tour ticket to see the greatest hits — nearly everything below is visible from the street, year-round, for free. (During Modernism Week in February you can tour interiors; the rest of the year, this is the way.)

Part 1: The downtown walking loop (45–60 minutes)

**Tramway Gas Station / Palm Springs Visitor Center** — Albert Frey, 1965. The soaring hyperbolic-roof gas station at the north end of Palm Canyon Drive is the city's unofficial gateway and the perfect starting point. Pick up a map inside.

**Palm Springs City Hall** — Frey, Robson Chambers, and John Porter Clark, 1952–56. A desert-modern civic building famous for the palm tree growing straight through its circular entry cutout.

**Coachella Valley Savings & Loan (now Chase Bank)** — E. Stewart Williams, 1961. Inverted arches and deep shade overhangs on South Palm Canyon; Williams also designed Frank Sinatra's first desert house.

**Bank of America building** — Rudy Baumfeld, 1959. A lavish modernist bank on South Palm Canyon inspired by Le Corbusier's Ronchamp chapel, with a curved wall and scalloped roof.

Part 2: The driving and biking loop (60–90 minutes)

**Kaufmann Desert House (Vista Las Palmas)** — Richard Neutra, 1946. The most famous modernist house in America, photographed by Julius Shulman into immortality. Private — view from the street only, and worth it.

**Elvis Honeymoon Hideaway (House of Tomorrow)** — Robert Alexander, 1960. Three circular stacked levels in Vista Las Palmas where Elvis and Priscilla honeymooned in 1967. One of the few landmark houses that periodically opens for paid tours.

**Twin Palms neighborhood** — William Krisel's 1957 Alexander tract: dozens of butterfly-roof homes where every house looks related but no two rooflines repeat. Drive slowly down South Compadre and East Twin Palms Drive; this is the purest concentration of Krisel modernism anywhere.

**Edris House** — E. Stewart Williams, 1954. A hillside glass-and-timber house above Little Tuscany that looks like it grew out of the boulders.

**Racquet Club Estates** — more Alexander/Krisel butterfly roofs and the 1960s steel houses by Donald Wexler, built from prefab steel and glass. Wexler's own steel house on East Simms Road is the purist's pilgrimage stop.

Part 3: If you have wheels and another hour

**Sunnylands, Rancho Mirage** — A. Quincy Jones, 1966. The 200-acre Annenberg estate; the gardens and visitor center are free and open to the public Wednesday through Sunday, seasonally. House tours require advance tickets and sell out.

**Palm Springs Aerial Tramway station** — Frey and Chambers, 1963. Even without riding the tram, the valley station itself is a landmark of desert modernism.

Rules of the road

• These are real homes. Photograph from the street or sidewalk, never the driveway or yard, and keep voices down in the neighborhoods.
• Best light for photos: the first two hours after sunrise, when the San Jacinto mountains go pink behind the rooflines.
• Summer plan: walk downtown at 8 a.m., drive the neighborhoods after, be done by 10:30.
• The visitor center sells a detailed mid-century modern map — the $5 map plus this route is everything you need.