A few days ago I was ever so lucky to visit a High Desert PreFab construction in Yucca Valley. My friend Caroline Ryder is writing an article about it for California Homes and knowing I have a little obsession for MCM, she invited me along.
Let me just say, wow! I can imagine this is not for everybody, but I am definitely not one of those people. I love the idea of being in the middle of what seems to be Nowhere, the only reminder of neighbours a tilted roofline behind some stone formation or another. To wake up and face the rocky hills, take my morning coffee up a giant boulder and shower outdoors just off my bathroom? It is supposed to be a holiday home, but I am pretty sure I could live there every day of the year.
Designed by Richard Neutra in 1946, his concept was to build a “machine in the landscape, juxtaposing a foreign-made construct onto a wild, unrefined, natural setting”. In the years since, Palm Springs growth has destroyed his vision and the area’s desert landscape has been invaded with non-indigenous plantings.
An integral aspect of the restoration of the Kaufmann House was the recreation of the tension between house and landscape. Using plants native to the Southwest desert, the surrounding residential environment was obscured and the sense of the home extending through the raw desert was re-established.
I can certainly say that this is not something we can attempt in our backyard, but if there is one thing to learn from this, is to keep our yard 'desert'. As God intended.
To mark the 125th birthday of a legendary lady this fall, Architectural Digest revisits her home and studio in New Mexico, as featured for the first time in AD's July 1981 issue.
I am not sure desert living gets more real than this.
We feel very lucky to have a studio each after a conversation I had with our neighbour. Working on his sculptures out of his garage is not ideal considering the temperatures are still in the triple figures. He is considering adding a little structure to the far corner of his yard.
So here are some I had on file.
B.
Please feel free to add crediits in the comments box, I archived those a while ago and I have no idea where they came from.
There are some, very lucky people, who happen to live in Joshua Tree, Steve Halterman is one of them. And looking at their perfect desert backyard I had to dedicate it to my favourite Cherokee.
Here’s a modern low maintenance house, and my idea of Desert Living.
This Californian prefab was designed by Marmol Radziner and is a great example of MCM philosophy for back to basics with low-maintenance and replaceable materials like concrete floors and metal siding. A 70-ft. covered porch offers outdoor entertaining areas for alfresco living during any season. Beyond the entrance, a sprawling outdoor lounge area sits beneath a curtain shade, overlooking the pool. Inside, behind floor-to-ceiling glass walls, minimalist interiors.
'Modern' nowadays comes in all shapes and forms. A friend of mine has just returned from Morocco with very exciting ideas for our patio, and off I went digging deep into Lonny Magazine achives. Considering most of the interior of our house is white, black and wood, I would love for the patio to have a wider bracket of ethnicities. I would be very happy with Ibiza meeting Casa Blanca, of course my favourite Cherokee is pulling towards Western tribal.
Coming up is the home of Adam Levine, a spread I came across in Architectural Digest magazine a while ago. In a nutshell, it is the kind of home that I admire, not just because of the bones, it is after all a refurbished 1940 ranch in the H'wood Hills, but also because there is a great balance between personality and design.
Not even the classics by Jean Prouvé, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Arne Jacobsen, Philippe Starck and artworks by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Shepard Fairey, Mark Seliger, Andy Warhol and the rest take character away from the owner.
And that's pretty special.
B.
Design credit Mark Haddawy, serial MCM collector and designer extraordinare.
Dream inspired because this is the stuff of my holiday dreams and not something I could do to our home.
This house may not be MCM per se, but it is Modern, and it applies many of the highlights of MCM philosophy.
Casa Messico is a vacation home in the Pacific coast of Mexico, designed by artist Gabriel Orozco and architect Tatiana Bilbao. Set on a rocky plot, this unusual home is a 1:1 scale replica of the Jantar Mantar observatory in New Delhi.
Notable too for its simple materials and technologies, this example of modern Mexican architecture is made of simply cast concrete, precast blocks, lime plaster, joinery and wood floors. This unusual house plan consists of just two rooms: a living room and a kitchen, which open to the outdoors.
Considering how everything feels like a mini holiday snap under Californian Light, I thought I would show a few hotels every now and then.
There is plenty of MCM to choose from in Palm Springs, however I would like to introduce the Avalon in Beverly Hills as it used to be our local Sunday brunch place when we lived in LA and the dyptic in the Penthouse office and the single abstract in the principal boardroom used to be mine. We have never stayed in any of their rooms, I simply find it interesting from a Design point of view.
I have to admit, I am more about the lounging space by the pool on this one.
I love those cabanas. The rest reminds me of a screaming lovechild between Art Deco and Mid Century Modern.
This could only work in LA!
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Lobby
Beverly Tower (Dark) Rooms
Penthouse
Boardroom
Bar and Restaurant
I could only find Kelly Wearstler as a credited designer for the main Lobby, but why would anyone need more than her! I find her rather brilliant.
Summer is still going strong in California so no back to school for us just yet, I thought I would post some colour to match the weather. Or maybe I just want to get rid of loud rooms in my archive.
I have been painting all day and Mr. has been composing all day (with the luxury of - finally! - a studio each) it may be time to meet up in middle ground.
After 15 years in London I moved to the Mojave Desert in California via a couple of years in Los Angeles. I love all MCM related design and architecture and here I can join together all the images that are helping us make our house a home and the Interiors I have photographed myself. Thanks for stopping by! BB
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Foto Credit 
Lobby
Penthouse
