This past weekend marked the end of Palm Springs Modernism Week, an annual event featuring lectures, exhibitions, and tours of iconic Modernist buildings in Palm Springs. A popular desert oasis vacation spot for wealthy Los Angeles residents, Palm Springs attracted many important Modernist architects like Richard Neutra, John Lautner, Donald Wexler, and William F. Cody.

One of the very best Modernist homes in Palm Springs is the Kaufmann Desert House, designed by Richard Neutra in 1946. A simple, elegant L-shaped structure of flat white ceilings and thin white-painted support columns, the house is mostly glass, better to showcase the resplendent scenery: an ultramarine pool, curving lawns and a desert garden, and a rocky mountainous backdrop. The visitors to Modernist Week who were able to tour this gem were truly lucky.