Twin Palms , also known as the Frank Sinatra House , at 1148 East Alejo Rd is a mid-century modern house in the Movie Colony–El Mirador neighborhood of Palm Springs, California . The house was designed by E. Stewart Williams , to a commission from the American singer and actor Frank Sinatra . The house was Williams's first residential commission.
19-403: Sinatra started coming to Palm Springs in the late 1940s. He had been told about it by his close friend, the composer Jimmy Van Heusen , who had stopped for fuel there while flying to Los Angeles. Van Heusen told Sinatra of the beauty of the desert later that day, and Sinatra insisted that they fly there that evening. Fellow acquaintances of Sinatra's who had also started frequenting Palm Springs in
38-611: A Kick in the Head ", and in Robin and the 7 Hoods (1964), in which Frank Sinatra sang the Oscar-nominated " My Kind of Town ". Cahn and Van Heusen also wrote " Love and Marriage " (1955), "To Love and Be Loved", " Come Fly with Me ", " Only the Lonely ", and " Come Dance with Me " with many of their compositions being the title songs for Frank Sinatra 's albums of the late 1950s. Van Heusen wrote
57-617: A part-time test pilot for Lockheed Corporation in World War II . Van Heusen then teamed up with lyricist Sammy Cahn . Their three Academy Awards for Best Song were won for " All the Way " (1957) from The Joker Is Wild , " High Hopes " (1959) from A Hole in the Head , and " Call Me Irresponsible " (1963) from Papa's Delicate Condition . Their songs were also featured in Ocean's Eleven (1960), which included Dean Martin 's version of " Ain't That
76-629: A staff pianist for some of the Tin Pan Alley publishers, and wrote "It's the Dreamer in Me" (1938) with lyrics by Jimmy Dorsey . Collaborating with lyricist Eddie DeLange , on songs such as "Heaven Can Wait", "So Help Me", and " Darn That Dream ", his work became more prolific, writing over 60 songs in 1940 alone. It was in 1940 that he teamed up with the lyricist Johnny Burke . Burke and Van Heusen moved to Hollywood and wrote for stage musicals and films throughout
95-577: A style known as desert modernism . Jimmy Van Heusen James Van Heusen (born Edward Chester Babcock ; January 26, 1913 – February 6, 1990 ) was an American composer . He wrote songs for films, television, and theater , and won an Emmy and four Academy Awards for Best Original Song . Many of his compositions later went on to become jazz standards . Born in Syracuse, New York , Edward Chester Babcock began writing music while in high school. He renamed himself to Jimmy Van Heusen at age 16, after
114-451: Is a single-story residential building, 4,500sq ft in size with 4 bedrooms and 7 bathrooms, constructed around long horizontal lines framed with steel and aluminum and windows that stretch to the ground. The house has a flat and slightly sloping roof, and a piano shaped swimming pool, the design of which was entirely accidental. The house is named for the two palm trees that stand next to it. The house would become an early emblematic example of
133-517: The Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1971. Van Heusen composed over 1000 songs of which 50 songs became standards. Van Heusen songs are featured in over five hundred and eighty films. Van Heusen was known to be quite popular among women. James Kaplan in his book Frank: The Voice (2010) wrote, "He played piano beautifully, wrote gorgeously poignant songs about romance...he had a fat wallet, he flew his own plane; he never went home alone." Van Heusen
152-618: The 1940s and early 1950s, winning an Academy Award for Best Original Song for " Swinging on a Star " (1944). Their songs were also featured in many Bing Crosby films including some of the Road films and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1949). He was also a pilot of some accomplishment; he met Joe Hornsby, who worked for the FAA in Los Angeles CA (Hornsby was the son of Dan Hornsby and
171-447: The 1940s included Lana Turner and Dinah Shore , and the actress Ava Gardner who was to become his second wife. On 1 May 1947 Sinatra walked into the offices of E. Stewart Williams , wearing a white sailor cap and eating an ice cream cone, and requested that the firm build him a Georgian style house as a weekend residence; he had recently signed a film contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer , and had made his first $ 1 million. Feeling that
190-458: The Georgian style was unsuitable for the extremes of the desert environment, Williams showed Sinatra two architectural drawings, one of the Georgian design, and the other of a single-storey modern house. Sinatra chose the modern design, and the house was to be Williams's first residential commission. Williams's brother and architectural partner, Roger, later said that he was "so glad" that Sinatra chose
209-485: The father of Nikki Hornsby ), because of his music career with his interest in flying. Joe Hornsby sponsored Jimmy into an exclusive pilots club called the Quiet Birdmen which held meetings at Proud Bird restaurant at LAX and these men were lifelong friends until Joe and his wife Dorothea's death in the late 1970s. He remained close friend with Nikki Hornsby until his own death. Using his birth name, Jimmy also worked as
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#1732858891753228-476: The house to Moss Hart so that he and Judy Garland could re-write A Star is Born . Twin Palms was subsequently photographed by Julius Shulman . The house was later occupied by a Texas couple for 43 years who let it become dilapidated, until its 1997 sale for $ 135,000. It was subsequently sold in 2000 for $ 1,345,000 and for $ 2.9 million in 2005. Twin Palms was offered for sale in 2010 for $ 3.25 million. Twin Palms
247-763: The late producer Bill Perlberg . Van Heusen retired in the late 1970s and died in 1990 in Rancho Mirage, California , from complications following a stroke at the age of 77. His wife, Bobbe, survived him. Van Heusen is buried near the Sinatra family in Desert Memorial Park , in Cathedral City, California . His grave marker reads Swinging on a Star . Van Heusen was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song 14 times in 12 different years (in both 1945 and 1964 he
266-414: The modern design, believing that "We'd have been ruined if we'd been forced to build Georgian in the desert". Sinatra demanded that the house be completed in time for a Christmas party he intended to host. The house was eventually finished shortly before the new year at a cost of $ 150,000. Sinatra lived in the house from its completion in 1947 to 1954, and sold it in 1957. Before selling it, Sinatra rented
285-634: The music for five Broadway musicals : Swingin' the Dream (1939); Nellie Bly (1946), Carnival in Flanders (1953), Skyscraper (1965), and Walking Happy (1966). While Van Heusen did not achieve nearly the success on Broadway that he did in Hollywood, at least two songs from Van Heusen musicals can legitimately be considered standards: " Darn That Dream " from Swingin' the Dream ; " Here's That Rainy Day " from Carnival in Flanders . He became an inductee of
304-472: The shirt makers Phillips-Van Heusen , to use as his on-air name during local shows. His close friends called him "Chet". Jimmy was raised Methodist . Studying at Cazenovia Seminary and Syracuse University , he became friends with Jerry Arlen, the younger brother of Harold Arlen . With the elder Arlen's help, Van Heusen wrote songs for the Cotton Club revue, including "Harlem Hospitality". He then became
323-532: Was Van Heusen who rushed Sinatra to the hospital after Sinatra, in despair over the breakup of his marriage to Ava Gardner , slashed one of his wrists in a suicide attempt in November 1953. However, this event was never mentioned by Van Heusen in any radio or print interviews given by him. Van Heusen himself married for the first time in 1969, at age 56, to Bobbe Brock, originally one of the Brox Sisters and widow of
342-407: Was nominated for two songs), and won four times: in 1944, 1957, 1959, and 1963. He won one Emmy Award for Best Musical Contribution, for the song " Love and Marriage " (1955) (lyrics by Sammy Cahn ), written for the 1955 Producers' Showcase production of Our Town . He was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1965 for Best Musical Score Written for a Motion Picture or TV show for Robin and
361-593: Was once described by Angie Dickinson , "You would not pick him over Clark Gable any day, but his magnetism was irresistible." In his 20s he began to shave his head when he started losing his hair, a practice ahead of its time. He once said "I would rather write songs than do anything else – even fly." Kaplan also reported that he was a " hypochondriac of the first order" who kept a Merck manual at his bedside, injected himself with vitamins and painkillers, and had surgical procedures for ailments real and imagined. I took song writing seriously when I discovered girls. It
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