The Aluminaire House

An exciting review of the history, architecture, and rescue of the Aluminaire House, a midcentury modern experimental house designed by architects A. Lawrence Kocher and Albert Frey and now moving to its new, permanent home at the Palm Springs Art Museum.

The Aluminaire House was conceived and constructed by Lawrence Kocher and Albert Frey as an exhibition house for the Allied Arts and Industry and Architectural League Exhibition of 1931 at the Grand Central Palace in New York City. It was intended to display standard mass-produced building materials, donated by the manufacturers. In addition to being a display of products, it was a demonstration of their use in making a repeatable, affordable house, bringing together the ideas of mass production with high-density communities.

The house is constructed of mostly aluminum and glass. It was intended to be mass produced and affordable, using inexpensive, off-the-shelf materials. The three-story house was constructed for the exhibit in just ten days, and during its first week on display, attracted more than 100,000 visitors.

The historic Aluminaire House is now being reconstructed in Palm Springs, on the grounds of the Palm Springs Art Museum, where it will be part of the museum’s permanent collection. The Aluminaire House is considered a masterpiece of modernist design, listed by Architectural Record as one of the most important buildings completed worldwide in the past 125 years.

Featuring over 150 black-and-white and full-color photographs, The Aluminaire House is an essential monograph for fans of midcentury modern and architectural history.

Frances Campani and Michael Schwarting are a husband-and-wife architect team who have worked for 36 years to save and protect the Aluminaire House and formed the Aluminaire House Foundation for that purpose. They established Campani and Schwarting Architects in 2000. Together, they have experience with many types and scales of work and have completed numerous projects involving new construction, additions, and renovations as well as urban design. Their work is known for its aesthetic distinction, attention to context and for its innovative use of materials. Frances Campani is an Assistant Professor of Architecture and Michael Schwarting is Professor Emeritus at New York Institute of Technology where the rescue of the Aluminaire began. Frances Campani and Michael Schwarting live and practice architecture in Port Jefferson, New York.