Located close to the San Jacinto Mountains and offering a wonderful view of the Coachella Valley and Santa Rosa Mountains, the property was carefully restored to its original splendor in the 1990s.įor a peek inside, a private one-hour guided tour – starting at 1pm or 3:30pm – can be arranged ahead of time. It also has a lush garden, large in-ground pool, and a tennis court. With its Jetsons-style furniture and lava rock wall, complete with electronic controls for indoor climate, outside lights and automatic rain, this place was considered, at the time, an innovative 'home of the future'.

Interestingly, despite its location in Palm Springs, this property was also included in an expert-reviewed list of all-time top 10 houses in Los Angeles, too.Īnother exemplar of Modernist style, this is the house where Elvis and Priscilla Presley lived in luxury during their first year of marriage, from 1966 to 1967, throwing infamously lavish parties. Today, many critics place the Kaufmann House among the most important buildings of the 20th century in the United States, along with the likes of the Fallingwater, Robie House, Gropius House, and the Gamble House. After Kaufmann's death in 1955, the house had a series of owners, including singer Barry Manilow. Large sliding glass walls bring the desert practically indoors, while the major outdoor rooms are enclosed by a row of movable vertical fins that offer flexible protection against sandstorms and intense heat. The five-bedroom, six-bathroom vacation house was designed to provide a seamless connection to the surrounding desert landscape, simultaneously offering shelter from the harsh climatic conditions. Soon after its completion in 1949, for what was then considered astronomical $300,000, the sleek forms and mechanical imagery of this building became an emblem of high Modernist style in the US.

The result was, arguably, Neutra's most famous design. In 1946, Kaufmann chose architect Richard Neutra – revered in his time as a pillar of American Modernism – to build a luxurious Desert House that would also function as an 'efficient machine'. Kaufmann: he needed a winter residence and he needed it in Palm Springs. Owning the most famous house in the world – the Fallingwater – was not enough for department store magnate Edgar J.

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