The Studebaker Avanti was designed in 1961 in a studio in the Palm Springs desert. Palm Springs became famous as a playground for celebrities. The town flourished from the forties through the sixties, when the modern movement was in full bloom. A couple of years ago property renovator Marc Sanders hit the real estate jackpot when he came across a 1947 house designed for
Frank Sinatra (who owned an Avanti) by Palm Springs architect Stewart Williams, complete with a piano-shaped pool in which Ava Gardner, Greta Garbo, and Lana Turner had splashed. A typical Palm Springs modernist villa has a low-slung pavilion with plenty of glass to capture striking views of desert, mountains, and the pool and garden. The big overhangs, sun-resistant metal and rock, and pools that have a cooling effect all look as stark today as they did when they were built. The area attracted architects now recognized as modern masters, both L.A. imports like Richard Neutra and John Lautner and locals like William Cody, Stewart Williams, and Albert Frey. In the late nineties, Frey's house for Avanti designer
Raymond Loewy, with its amoeba-shaped indoor/outdoor pool and its view-framing trellis, was restored by metalware manufacturer Jim Gaudineer.
Palm Springs Life Magazine
