In the pantheon of mid-century modern architect-gods, one name gets a little less play than he deserves: Charles Du Bois. Though not as prolific as the team of Palmer & Krisel or as visionary as William Cody, Du Bois most definitely left his mark in the Vista Las Palmas neighborhood when it was developed by the Alexander Construction Company in the late 1950s and early ‘60s. While Krisel homes in the neighborhood are easily identifiable by his signature “butterfly roofs,” Du Bois took a decidedly different approach.
Among his creations were residences with wide A-frame entries and vaulted interior ceilings. Because the entrances resembled chalets in the Swiss Alps, they became known as Swiss Miss houses. The irony is that the most likely explanation of Du Bois’s inspiration for this unique style is that he capitalized on the Tiki craze of the time. The distinct entrance is probably Du Bois’s interpretation of the outrigger design common in Polynesian structures. Du Bois was hardly alone in capitalizing on this trend. While Alexander was executing Du Bois’s designs in Vista Las Palmas, Richard Harrison and Donald Wexler were designing Royal Hawaiian Estates in South Palm Springs – a neighborhood that would be declared the city’s first historic district in 2010.
At last count, 15 Swiss Miss homes were still standing. The most famous of these is located at 722 N. High Street. Built in 1958, the house features four bedrooms and three full bathrooms. The home is unique because its first owner requested that a smaller replica structure be built for use as an art studio. Both houses feature walls of glass and massive stone fireplaces. The home is currently on the market for $3,380,000.
While the price is certainly remarkable, it doesn’t come close to matching the life and times of its second owner, Ann Heavey, who died in 2018 at the age of 95. She was one of the Valley’s remarkable women, in the mold of Nellie Coffman, Pearl McManus, Ruth Hardy, Barbara Sinatra, and Leonore Annenberg.
“She was like Auntie Mame,” recalls her granddaughter, Manuela Noble, a film producer whose most recent work is “Freud’s Last Session” with Anthony Hopkins. Noble’s mother, world-renowned portrait painter Baroness Ilona Von Ronay, often left Noble with her grandparents in Palm Springs as she globe-trotted the world for commissions. “She loved to travel,” Noble says. “I remember once sitting in Mr. Landrey’s office at Palm Valley School. He was our headmaster. And my grandmother was there. She wanted to take me to the Winter Olympics in Austria. And then we were going to go to Poland, and then Paris. Twice a year, she went to Mr. Alexander’s in Paris to have her hair cut. And she said to Mr. Landry, ‘What good does it do her to sit in this class all the time with these stupid children? She will learn more living in the world.’ Mr. Landry just smiled and said, ‘Oh, I agree.’”
When World War II ended, the future Mrs. Ann Heavey was a 23-year-old Austrian widow with a small child. She worked with the Red Cross in Vienna and met Colonel John Heavey, a flight surgeon from Berkeley, California, at a party at the Hotel Bristol. Dr. Heavey was also no slouch when it came to adventure. Growing up in the Bay Area, he often daydreamed about being on a ship as it sailed past the Golden Gate Bridge. After obtaining a medical degree, he saw an ad in the newspaper for a ship’s doctor. He got the job and spent the next year sailing around the world. The life he shared with Ann and Ilona was no less adventurous, according to Noble. He took postings all over the world; Noble says the four years they spent in Morocco were their favorite.
The family came to Palm Springs to visit friends in the mid-1960s. Noble says they were in love as soon as they stepped out of the plane. The desert and the high, snow-capped mountains reminded them of Morocco. They bought the Swiss Miss house on High Street (it might have reminded Mrs. Heavey of Austrian mountain chalets) and intended to make Palm Springs home for the next five years. They lived here the rest of their lives.
Noble says her grandmother was a dynamo who was always involved in a half-dozen projects. While her husband continued to practice medicine (he devoted one day per week to pro bono work), Ann Heavey founded Palm Springs Friends of Philharmonic and the Palm Springs Opera Guild. She was instrumental in getting plans for the new Palm Springs Art Museum off the ground. “My grandmother noticed all these retired ladies in Palm Springs doing nothing,” Noble says. “They were ladies who lunched. She rounded them all up and put them to work. I have vivid memories of being really young and licking endless stamps and envelopes. When my penmanship got better, I was allowed to address the envelopes.”
The house on High Street was deeply loved and well-lived in, Noble says. Her mother used the studio when she was in her 20s and starting out as an artist. “My grandmother took it over pretty quickly and made it into guest quarters” when her mother went on the road, Noble says. Austrian Federal President Thomas Klestil and famed conductor Zubin Mehta were among the guests who came to stay in the studio. “My grandmother entertained like a banshee,” Noble says with a laugh. “She loved to cook, and it seems like every day, there was a luncheon or a cocktail party or a dinner. She would put 10 tables out on the back lawn, each seating eight people.”
Her mother moved through many strata of society, Noble says. Celebrities and people of note were always coming and going at the house. Sophia Loren and her husband, Carlo Ponti, were close friends, as were the Mehtas, Kirk Douglas and his wife, and Itzhak Perlman.
Noble recalls one evening when she was in high school and out with friends. When they came back to her grandparents’ house, a party was breaking up. Noble decided it would be dramatic to take her friends through the front entrance. Just as they approached, the door opened and her grandfather ushered out a couple and said good night. Noble and her friends stepped aside for the couple. “Gee, they look just like Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers,” Noble said to her grandfather. He gave her a long look and said, “Manuela, that was Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.”
