Albert Frey

Architect Albert Frey (1903-1998) saw modernist utopia in the desert. Born in Zurich, he studied in Europe with Le Corbusier before moving to the United States in 1930, convinced it was the land of architectural opportunity. On a visit to Palm Springs, he fell under the desert spell. It was here, amid the arid and empty landscape, that he could truly envisage a perfect modern future.Like fellow Californian luminary, John Lautner, Frey would spend the rest of his career nurturing the consonance of architecture and nature: studying the fall of sunlight and rain, merging aluminium, steel, and glass with the boulders and sands of the West Coast wilds. His vision centered in particular on Palm Springs, capitalizing on the city's post-war population boom to create a bastion of the sleek, leisurely modernism that defines mid-century California.