We stopped in California to visit our daughter & her family before heading back to Nanjing…. & it was a very pleasant visit, as always! She took us on an excursion to Palm Springs, a desert resort area about 100 miles (160 km) east of LA – home of the ‘Rat Pack’ entertainers (i.e., Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., etc.) back in the 1950s & 1960s.

Palm Springs Visitors Center

That was also the time & place of an architectural movement called ‘Mid-Century Desert Modernism‘ – a movement characterized by buildings with dramatic rooflines, wide overhangs, lots of glass walls & windows, open floor plans, and outdoor living spaces incorporated right into the building’s design. Today the city holds a ‘Modernism Week’ every February, and even the Visitors Center on the outskirts of town – a former gas station – has that distinctive look. We checked out the structural sights, & also took the Aerial Tramway to the top of the mountain for a nice regional overview.

The city is modern in another way too, clearly evident from that mountain view. One could see row upon row of windmills, helping to meet California’s Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) which requires that 50% of the electricity generated in the state must be generated by renewable sources by 2030. California has also led the country in developing a very progressive ‘cap & trade’ carbon market, which sets a statewide limit on emission sources responsible for 85 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions.