HOME TOUR: Frey House II
- Words Lyra Kilston
- Photos Elizabeth Carababas
Inside the modest home that became the spiritual heart of Palm Springs’ modernist tradition.
The dining table also served as Frey’s drafting table, offering views across the pool to Palm Springs.
The San Jacinto Mountains rise abruptly from the floor of the Southern California desert, a series of steep rocky slopes in shades of mahogany and tan, their ridgeline jagged against the pure blue sky. Half hidden in the mountainside, about 220 feet up, is Frey House II, the home of Swiss-born architect Albert Frey for more than three decades. Completed in 1964, the house is nearly transparent: a simple glass rectangle with a slanted roof, its steel frame anchored to the landscape by a large granite boulder that protrudes into the house. It’s a curious meeting of the natural world and rational modernism, perched in a serene, otherworldly setting.
