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Much was made of Neutra's skirting of local ordinances that prohibited second stories, but similar upper-level sleeping porches were commonplace in the desert. They were often included in early Spanish-style homes that, in pre-air conditioning days, had sleeping porches (or gloriettes) that caught the evening breeze and allowed locals to sleep outdoors during the hottest summer months. The origins of the house are familiar to architecture fans because of the pedigree of its owner, Edgar Kaufmann, the Pittsburg department store magnate. Kaufmann meant no disrespect to Wright, but he sought a home more open and airy than anything in Wright's vocabulary.
About Kaufmann House design and construction.
When the Harrises decided to end their marriage, they faced a dilemma regarding the disposition of the house. Both were clear that the house required a special buyer who would fully appreciate its cultural significance and provide the kind of maintenance such a property requires. They hit upon a seemingly perfect solution -- they offered the house at auction as a piece of art. A precedent had already been set with the 2003 Sotheby's auction of Mies van der Rohe's innovative Farnsworth house which sold for $7.5 million. The Harrises went with Christies who put a pre-auction estimate for the house at $15-25 Million.
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To continue their efforts of preservation, they decided to put the house for auction at Christie's auction for high profile, contemporary, art. They believed that only serious buyers interested in continuing the preservation of this historical site would purchase the house at an auction. The house sold at auction for 19.1 million dollars by an anonymous buyer but later fell out of escrow. Unfortunately, only glimpses of it can be seen from the street including its famous ‘gloriette’ roof deck. In the north wing another corridor opens along an outside patio that leads to two other rooms.
Richard Neutra – Palm Springs-California USA, 1946
While Beth Harris may have moved to Los Angeles, many feel her heart has stayed behind in Palm Springs. Her former husband Brent also continues to actively support preservation activities in Palm Springs and is currently restoring a Welton Becket-designed home in the historic Tennis Club neighborhood. In 1996, the house was designated a historic site by the Palm Springs Historic Site Preservation Board.
Completed in 1946, the Kaufmann Desert House was an instant sensation, and soon the five-bedroom, five-bathroom vacation house became an important catalyst that kick started the post war surge of Modernist architecture in and around Palm Springs. Inside the home, the main floor layout is centered around a living and dining room with its floor-to-ceiling windows and brick-fronted fireplace. The master suite, additional bedrooms and service wing are along adjoining corridors or covered walkways. After Kaufmann's death in 1955, the property cycled through a number of high-profile owners, including Barry Manilow and former San Diego Chargers owner Eugene Klein.
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The gloriette, a serene outdoor room above the house, was Richard Neutra’s creative way of bypassing zoning codes that forbade two-story structures.
The Kaufmann Desert House by Richard Neutra
Following Edgar Kaufmann's death in 1955, his desert house sold to Francis C. Park, who in turn sold it in 1962 to art dealer Joseph Linsk and his wife Nelda. Ft. of interior space by converting a patio into a media room; a wall was removed so the newly enclosed space could open into the original living room; additional air conditioning was placed on the roof that cluttered the roof planes. The south wing connects to the public realm and includes a carport and two long covered walkways. These walkways are separated by a massive stone wall and led to public and service entries, respectively. The east wing of the house is connected to the living space by a north-facing internal gallery and houses a master bedroom suite.
The Hidden History of the Kaufmann House
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The war moratoriums were slowly lifted as World War II ended, but relatively strict building regulations remained enforced. However, Neutra was able to find his way around the restrictions by breaking ground on the foundation a few days before the official enforcement. The project resulted in a total cost of nearly $300,000, surpassing the current single-family residence average of $40,000. Neutra’s work is notable for its ability to blur the boundary between inside and outside. In the Kaufmann House, this is done with walls that run from the interior to the exterior clad in the same stone material.
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Architects worldwide have extracted principles from this building throughout the course of history. The house still stands today and is considered one of the essential pieces of 20th-century architecture among projects such as Fallingwater, Robie House, Gropius House, and Gamble House. This allowed home inhabitants to walk from the interior to the exterior without sensing a temperature change on the floor. They would feel as though they were on the same surface even after crossing the glass line and over to the exterior hardscape slab. In 1946 Edgar Kaufmann commissioned Richard Neutra to design a winter vacation home in Palms Springs, California. A decade earlier, he hired Frank Lloyd Wright to design his renowned Fallingwater house.
The way in which Neutra designed the Kaufmann House was such that when the sliding glass doors were opened the differentiation of interior and exterior was blurred as if it was a sinuous space. The Harrises purchased the home for US$1.5 million, then sought to restore the home to its original design. Neutra had died in 1970, and as the original plans were not available, the couple brought to Los Angeles architects Leo Marmol and Ron Radziner to restore the house.
Following the end of World War II, he was commissioned for the Kaufmann house, and it later became a beloved piece of the renowned International Style architecture he was known for. The variety of spaces, ranging from enclosed to semi-enclosed to open, transcends any traditional distinction between indoors and outdoors in favor of a continuous, human-made environment. Moreover, the new environment was designed so that its occupants could fine-tune its features for physical comfort, most notably the radiant heating and cooling systems for the concrete surfaces of the outside terraces. Lastly, within the hostile desert surroundings the new environment was to be a safe one as exemplified by the mirrors Neutra installed in unexpected places, which allowed the inhabitants to scan their immediate surroundings. Neutra used as basic materials stone, glass and steel, and tended not to depart from the range of colors than the desert offered, so that the house does not desentonase of their natural environment.
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