Arthur Elrod

Arthur Elrod was the most successful interior designer working in Palm Springs from 1954 to 1974. His forward-thinking midcentury design appeared in primary homes, second houses, spec houses, country clubs, and experimental houses—in the desert and across the US. He was charming, handsome, and worked tirelessly for his A-list clientele.

Paying homage to the seminal mid-century modern architecture of Palm Springs, this luxurious book showcases historic jet-set homes designed by legendary talents such as Richard Neutra, Albert Frey, and Paul Williams, as well as private residences by today’s leading tastemakers. Since Gary Cooper built one of the first modernist houses in Palm Springs in the 1930s, this desert oasis has entranced Hollywood. A mecca for the international jet set that lured Frank Sinatra, Walter Annenberg, and others, Palm Springs came into its own architecturally as a haven for visionary modernists such as Richard Neutra, who were practicing the International Style in Los Angeles. The architectural legacy remains unsurpassed for its originality and influence, and recently many of the city’s modernist residential treasures have been restored. In original new photography, Palm Springs captures the allure of this famed modernist destination. The book profiles outstanding examples such as the Annenberg Estate, the Ford House, and the Kaufmann House, shown in their splendor, as well as today’s restorations by top interior designers such as Martyn Lawrence Bullard and fashion designer Trina Turk. A resource section provides modernist furnishing stores and other points of interest.

This classic volume, now available at a lower price, showcases jet-set homes designed by the likes of Neutra, Frey, Lautner, and others. Palm Springs is famous as a mecca for the international jet set. But the city has also attracted its share of eccentrics and mavericks who have left an architectural legacy that remains unsurpassed for its originality and international influence. This book examines the impact that architects and designers have had on the desert oasis, primarily from the 1940s to the 1960s. Palm Springs Modern features examples of midcentury modernism at its most glamorous, some of them the residences of prominent figures who commissioned weekend getaways in the desert, including Frank Sinatra, Walter Annenberg, and Raymond Loewy. Adéle Cygelman’s insightful text, a foreword by architectural historian Joseph Rosa, contemporary color photography by David Glomb, and the celebrated archival black-and-white work of Julius Shulman all capture the distinctly modern allure of America’s famed desert playground.

Centuries after serving the king of England as his vampire protector, Richard, now a highly paid anti-terrorist consultant to the Canadian government, is drawn into a deadly race to save his creator, the Lady Ardis, and with her all humanity.

Radical. Visionary. Poetic. Inside Utopia shows the future of living that architects and designers have envisioned. Spectacular and reflective, unpretentious and efficient: the breathtaking Elrod House by John Lautner; the Lagerfeld Apartment near Cannes that seems like a set from a science fiction film; Palais Bulles in France with its organic and unique architecture. These interiors welcome habitation and spark curiosity while embodying the foundations of minimalism and bygone visions of the future. Inside Utopia delves into the rhyme and reason behind past designs that we still interact with today. The architects, the owners, and the craftsmen like Gio Ponti or Bruce Goff who work behind the scenes created amorphous interiors that invite the mind to wander. At the time they were futuristic, confident, utopian, idealistic-- we may not realize it, but they have shaped our current living concepts, and even now, they inspire us anew. Previously it has been difficult to attain access to these preserved interiors, but Inside Utopia unearths what was before unseen.

Blount County was carved out of the territory ceded to the State by the Creek Indians following their defeat at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. The earliest settlers began streaming into the former wilderness as early as 1817. Blount was originally a large county, but over the decades pieces were taken to make up other adjoining counties such as Jefferson, Marshall, Etowah, and Cullman. Every cemetery within the contemporary boundaries of Blount was visited by the author and each readable tombstone was copied to develop the contents of this three volume series. Most of the cemeteries were read in 2002. Volume 1 covers alphabetically A through H, beginning with the Alldredge Family Cemetery and concluding with the High Rock Methodist Church Cemetery. This book is vital to any serious student of Blount County genealogy and history.

In the brief biographical essays of The Human Tradition in America since 1945, students will meet a wide range of diverse individuals-both men and women, rich and poor, powerful and vulnerable-who represent key elements of post-World War II America.

The homes of the discerning Hollywood stars, from Grouch Marx to Leonardo DiCaprio This book looks at the intersection of celebrity and design, through the case of twenty-five houses designed by great architects for their informed, trend-setting, and extremely famous clients, in Southern California. Included are gorgeous photos of the houses as well as little seen informal portraits of the stars and wonderfully detailed texts that tell the story of these members of the glitterati, touching on film, fashion, architecture, and the everyday lives of legends. Hollywood Modern spans the modern era, from moderne homes of the 1930s, through mid-century modern designs, to the present day. Hollywood Modern touches on the many moods of modernism. From Ed Niles "Johnny Carson House" in Malibu, which creates a ficus tree forest that extends from the garden directly into the house, to the machine-age austerity of Richard Neutra's "Von Sternberg House," (later owned by The Fountainhead author Ayn Rand), to A. Quincy Jones' crisply, elegantly ultramodern Gary Cooper House in Holmby Hills, these houses edit, rearrange and direct our point of view much like the carefully composed version of reality we see in motion pictures. These different styles co-exist as modernism and stand in distinct contrast to the Mediterranean villas and Spanish Colonial manses of early Hollywood.