Photo Essay: Light and Space in William Cody's Palm Springs Home

When I was in Palm Springs last month for Modernism Week, I missed the opportunity to visit the Cody Family Residence, which artist Phillip K. Smith III had taken over with a temporary, site-specific installation of his light and space sculptures.

It was a one-time event that was happening just days after I'd be leaving Palm Springs. And my schedule didn't allow me to return so soon. 

Fortunately, the PKSIII installation is taking reservations through April 5—so a month later, I made my way back to the Coachella Valley just to see it. 

And it was worth the trip. 

 

Photo Essay: Disney Imagineers Are Building a Town Near Palm Springs, Called Cotino

To be honest, I signed up for a tour of Cotino—"A Storyliving by Disney™ Community"—in Rancho Mirage, California during this year's Modernism Week because it was free.

 

 

It wasn't until I got to its sales office that I realized they might actually try to sell me one of the homes where "the Disney touch is at the heart of it all."

Photo Essay: In Search of a Desert Modernist's Legacy at Batman's Former Palm Springs Home

The Old Las Palmas neighborhood began in the 1920s as a simple subdivision of Palm Springs, California, but it became one of the premiere residential neighborhoods of the desert getaway city. 

It's been home for the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio, Kirk Douglas, Dinah Shore, Donna Reed, Liberace, and many more stars—and word has it, it's got the most celebrity homes of all the Palm Springs neighborhoods. 

During Modernism Week, I headed to Old Las Palmas to get inside the former residence of actor Adam West, best known for portraying Batman on the 1960s TV series.

Photo Essay: This Mid-Century Palm Springs Estate Shines With or Without Its Howard Hughes History

Every year, it's overwhelming to go through the Modernism Week schedule and try to figure out which tours to take. 

I'll admit, I get lazy and sometimes just choose based on a certain amount of star power. I haven't yet gone wrong with the Frank Sinatra, Kirk Douglas, William Holden, or Gummo Marx estates. 

 

But the Howard Hughes Residence in Palm Springs has a lot more to offer than just a celebrity pedigree of an eccentric aerospace engineer and movie mogul.

Photo Essay: Desert Resort Living In a Mid-Century Modern Lodge

It's one of those places I'd drive past so many times—and never really understood what it was. 

I thought the Ocotillo Lodge on East Palm Canyon Drive in Palm Springs was a motel, and that it was being converted into condos. 

The real story is that it was a hotel (kind of)—and then it was converted into condos in the 1990s. But right now, it's going through an upgrade/restoration. 

Photo Essay: A Celebrity Estate for the Ages, the Kirk Douglas Residence in Palm Springs

Late actor Kirk Douglas hadn't lived in his Palm Springs estate at 515 Via Lola since 1999...

Poster courtesy of SenseiAlan via Flickr (CC by 2.0 DEED)

...but after he spent 40 years' worth of vacations there, it will forever be known as the "Kirk Douglas Residence." 

Photo Essay: A Modernism Week Shimmy Through the Shag House, Palm Springs

I wasn't sure I needed to see the so-called "Shag House," having already visited artist Josh Agle's own abode (which he decorated) as well as that of a superfan neighbor of his. 

Turns out, this circa 1958 Modernist home—designed by the architecture duo Palmer & Krisel for the Alexander Construction Company—was the Modernism Week tour I just didn't know I needed to take. 

Photo Essay: A Covered Wagon Caravan Through Coachella Valley Preserve

"Oh, we're closed for the summer. It's going to be too hot out."

That's what they told me when I called to book a covered wagon tour of the San Andreas Fault near Palm Springs for myself back in 2009, when I'd just arrived for a month in Joshua Tree.

It was unseasonably cool that June. But temps in the High Desert can easily be 20 degrees lower than in the low desert.

And they were right—because within a week of my arrival, the thermometer hit three digits. And it just kept going up over the course of my four-week stay.

Somehow, I never managed to get around to calling Covered Wagon Tours again, despite having returned to the area many times—and in much friendlier temperatures, usually in the winter and spring. 

 

That changed last month, when my friend John was in town for a work conference and mentioned that one of their optional off-site activities was a covered wagon tour. I burst out with an "Oooh!"

Photo Essay: A Driving Discovery of Modernism in Downtown Palm Springs' Commercial District

This is the first year that I won't be at Modernism Week in Palm Springs since I first went in 2017. I even went in 2021 in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But I had a friend visiting the low desert the week before Modernism Week this year—and since I couldn't afford two trips in February, I chose my friend.  

But fortunately he was very interested in the Midcentury Modern architecture of Palm Springs—so we enthusiastically signed up for a self-guided driving tour offered by Modern Tours Palm Springs, which allowed us to explore various Palm Springs neighborhoods at our own pace.

Photo Essay: The 8th Wonder of the World Is In... Palm Springs? (Or, How Helicopters Help Build An Engineering Marvel On the Sheer Cliffs of the San Jacinto Mountains)

Back in 2009, during one of my first visits to Palm Springs, I did what tourists do: I rode the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway. 

circa 2009

The sign at North Palm Canyon Drive and Tramway Road advertised "Rotating Tram Cars"—and I figured it was a scenic way to get to a cooler elevation during the summer heat of June. (Besides, I was also lured by the Albert Frey-designed former gas station, which had been transformed into a visitors' center.) 

How I Wandered SoCal for KCET in 2022

I haven't often reposted the articles I've written for KCET here—often because much of the content that has gotten published here first has eventually made its way into my KCET guides.

But as time has gone on, I've created more and more original content for my SoCal Wanderer column on KCET.org. In fact, probably more in the year 2022 than in any other years prior.

SoCal Wanderer articles are on a little bit of a hiatus—at least, compared to what they've been—since I was hired to work in-house at KCET in actually a different capacity. They may not resume anytime soon. 

So in the meantime, here's a recap of the articles I did contribute over the past year, in case you missed any of them. Click on the titles to open the articles in a new tab/window.

Beyond Colossus: Tracing 50 Years of Thrilling History at Six Flags

 

Photo Essay: Palm Springs' House of Tomorrow, Exorcised of Its Elvis 'Sideshow'

Although Elvis did have a house in Beverly Hills, Palm Springs seems like it was more like the West Coast home-away-from-Memphis of our dearly-departed King of Rock and Roll.

 

And that's where there's the modernist home leased for him by Colonel Tom Parker for a year starting in 1966—built in 1960 as "The House of Tomorrow" by architect William Krisel.

Photo Essay: Golf Carts on Parade in Palm Desert, Rolling Out of a Pandemic Hiatus

When I was researching golf carts for my post on the golf cart museum in La Quinta, California earlier this year, I came across some information about an annual golf cart parade that takes place just before Halloween in the nearby community of Palm Desert, also in the Coachella Valley. 

I knew I had to go.  

Photo Essay: Dinny & Mr. Rex Are a Pair of Halloween Treats in Cabazon

I'd seen the Cabazon Dinosaurs dressed up for lots of other holidays, like Christmas, Valentine's Day, and Easter....

...but I hadn't yet seen them in costume for the ultimate dress-up holiday, Halloween. 

A Dream Encounter With the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile (Or, the Day We Had Hot Dogs For Breakfast)

The first time I ever got to see the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile up close, it was in Palm Springs in April 2021. (I might've seen one in the wild on the freeway or from a distance before that, but I can't quite remember.)

 

circa 2021

Photo Essay: A 1960s Tropical Enclave for Jewish Seniors, Now a Mid-Century Historic District

It all started when I stayed at Rodeway Inn's Royal Sun motel in Palm Springs, California back in November 2020. 

Photo Essay: Temple Isaiah, Where A Modernist Chapel Is Hidden Underneath a Giant, Brutalist Boat

Temple Isaiah in Palm Springs, California isn't just one temple—but two. 

And it's not just a synagogue—but also a Jewish Community Center, performing arts center, concert hall, and screening room for the Palm Springs Jewish Film Festival. 

Photo Essay: A Hot Time at the Date Orchard, Where Sex and God Collide

When I first started spending time in the Palm Springs area in 2009, I took a tour of Oasis Date Gardens—and I thought that was enough. 

I didn't realize how absolutely baffling and curious the nearby Shields Date Garden was. 

Photo Essay: Caddy Cars, Grocery Getters, and Marketeers at A Museum of Vintage Golf Carts

I'm almost always up for visiting any kind of car museum—and in Palm Springs last week, that meant making a stop to the National Museum of Golf Cars. 

 

From Sunset Boulevard to Deepwell Estates: William Holden's Modernist Palm Springs Home

In the song "Tom's Diner," Suzanne Vega sings of reading a newspaper in which "There's a story/Of an actor/Who had died/While he was drinking/He was no one/I had heard of." 

Vega confirmed later she'd written those lines about actor William Holden—the Oscar-winning star of Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, Network—who died in 1981 from bleeding to death after falling while drunk. 

He was living in Santa Monica then—but before that, he was a denizen of Palm Springs. 

And last month, Modernism Week opened up the former "William Holden Estate" for tours.*

*no photos were permitted inside