Palm Springs, California, USA
“This is the anti-Palm Springs house,” state Woods + Dangaran. “It is not overtly midcentury modernist, there is no bright blue pool. It is in the hills, not the flats. This is a different kind of Palm Springs vacation home, while still being extremely of its place.”
Designed by Woods + Dangaran, Desert Palisades, a stunning just completed Palm Springs weekend home is a refreshingly minimalist architecture that feels dreamily escapist and at the same time warm and comfortingly domestic.
For its modernist flair, Desert Palisades has recently been awarded a 2023 International Architecture Award by The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design and The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.
Viewed from the valley side and from below, the house seems almost alien, something that has rather theatrically and forcefully descended from space and chosen this inhospitable rockscape as its current position.
It seems strangely temporary and permanent at the same time.
It doesn’t belong but still feels breathtakingly grand and perfect for this hostile terrain.
At the same time, the creation of this piece of architecture looks at the home’s desert context for inspiration, finding the right balance, between old and new, softness and convenience, and the harshness and powerful character of the surrounding Santa Rosa and San Jacinto mountains and the arid climate of the Palm Springs desert.
From sitting to the floor plan to finishes, this residence is deeply connected to the desert environment and its context in the hills above Palm Springs.
Surrounded by boulders and spanning a natural arroyo, the home is lifted above existing site features, yet still retains a powerful connection to the earth.
The architecture—emphasizing horizontal lines, natural materials, and visual and physical linkages between indoors and out—celebrates and elevates the tenets of desert modernism.
The combination of clean lines and a mix of glass, masonry walls, and metal feel at home in their wider natural and suburban context.
The architects worked with a simple, low, and linear volume that would contain a finely tuned interior.
Exterior walls of earth-toned plaster and textured concrete masonry units tie the slab-on-grade structure to the site.
Deep roof overhangs are wrapped in brass paneling.
Strategically-placed floor-to-ceiling glazing frames stunning views of the desert in all directions.
A glass-enclosed bridge connects two wings of the home and creates a central atrium that can be viewed from nearly every room.
The house contains four bedrooms, several bathrooms, as well as a large living space.
Large sliding glass doors run the length of the great room and provide an uninterrupted transition to an outdoor dining area, deck, pool, spa, fireplace, and lounge.
A swimming pool and paved terrace offer alfresco entertaining options – as does many a Palm Springs house, yet this one’s delicate architectural equilibrium ensures it feels distinctly of its time, as well as its place.
Project: Desert Palisades
Architects: Woods + Dangaran
Client: Brett Woods, Woods + Dangaran
Photographers: Joe Fletcher
