Coachella Valley Savings No. 2

Architect: Emerson Stewart Williams
Style: Mid-Century Modern
City: Palm Springs, CA
Collection: desert modernism

Coachella Valley Savings No. 2, in downtown Palm Springs, is a bank building designed by master architect E. Stewart Williams in the International Style he used briefly for commercial work in the early 1960s. It's built with a flat roof, deep overhangs, steel-frame construction, and no applied ornamentation, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016.

the building

Inverted-arch columns. The building's most prominent feature is its inverted arches of reinforced concrete, which rise to form the columns that hold up the roof.

the style

Williams used the International Style for commercial buildings only briefly in the early 1960s, and this bank belongs to that short run — defined by a flat roof, deep overhangs, steel-frame construction, and a deliberate lack of applied ornamentation.

the architect

E. Stewart Williams worked in the International Style for commercial buildings for only a brief span in the early 1960s; this bank is one of the examples from that period, built in unornamented concrete and steel.

significance

The building has also been known as Coachella Valley Savings & Loan Association, Washington Mutual, and Chase Bank as ownership changed over the years, and a related building, Coachella Valley Savings No. 1, also exists. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016.

nearby

Coachella Valley Savings No. 1 0.1 mi · Mid-Century Modern
Avalon Hotel and Bungalows Palm Springs 0.1 mi · Spanish Colonial Revival · 1929
Santa Fe Federal Savings and Loan Association 0.2 mi · Streamline Moderne
First Church of Christ, Scientist 0.5 mi · Mid-Century Modern
Palm Springs Art Museum 0.6 mi · 1938
Frey House II 0.6 mi · Mid-Century Modern · 1964

All 21 buildings in Palm Springs