Coinciding with the recent opening of California Designing Freedom at The Design Museum, our Sales Manager Rosie recently returned from a tour of the West Coast.

“We were only in Palm Springs for 24 hours so we rented bikes and cycled all over. We saw Elvis’ honeymoon hideaway, the Kaufmann Desert House and a lot of amazing civic and commercial buildings. Seeing the style in the context of that landscape was incredible, the glass reflects the huge open skies and the views to the hills.

“The Kaufmann House was a highlight, it was designed by Richard Neutra in the mid-1940s and restored to his original design by Marmol Radziner in the early 1990s. Netura had died in the 1970s so it was a big archival project that drew on a lot of old photographs of the interior.

“For the rest of the trip we drove from San Francisco to San Diego via Yosemite, Las Vegas, the Grand Canyon and the Joshua Tree National Park.  The Art Deco buildings in San Diego were really cool, and the Hoover Dam – we drove through the Nevada Desert in a Mustang to see that. Vegas was a monstrosity!

“The Skull Rock trail at the Joshua Tree National Park was also really special, they’re natural rock formations – it was a surreal landscape.”

California Designing Freedom picks up the story of design in the 1960s and charts the journey from counterculture to the Silicon Valley. The exhibition is on display from 24 May – 15 October 2017.

24 May – 15 October 2017
10.00-18.00
Adult £16
Student/ concession £12
Children under 6 years free

The Design Museum
224 – 238 Kensington High Street
London
W8 6AG

Find out more here.