White and pastel stucco storefronts from the 1930s to the 1950s line a wide, palm lined boulevard, with brass stars set into the sidewalk.
What Palm Canyon Drive looks like
Palm Canyon Drive is Palm Springs' main commercial street, a wide boulevard lined with mature date palms. Brass stars for are set into pink terrazzo sidewalks along several blocks, one name at a time.
Low stucco storefronts run from block to block, one and two storeys, in white and pastel colors that mostly date from the 1930s to the early 1950s. , an open air shopping block anchored by the Plaza Theatre's marquee, opened behind white stucco arcades and a red tile roof in 1936.
Across the street, the shows a flatter, glass walled face from the early 1950s. Farther north, the has an open arcade at street level. Iron balconettes and columns rise above the shopfronts, with apartments on the floor over them.
Farther south, a two storey building with white vertical louvers over an open ground floor was built as a savings and loan and is now an event space. A second bank building nearby runs a white concrete colonnade of parabolic arches along the sidewalk.
The boulevard widens near Tahquitz Canyon Way, with bare mountains rising at the end of nearly every block. Awnings and midcentury signage still shade most of the storefronts, and parked cars line the kerb for the length of the street.
Shot in Palm Canyon Drive
Less Than Zero used under its own name and address in 1987. Mack & Rita filmed a scene nearby at in 2022.
Less Than Zero, 1987
The Hyatt
James Spader and Robert Downey Jr.'s characters crash at the Hyatt in Less Than Zero, the hotel used under its own name and address on North Palm Canyon Drive. It is still an all suite Hyatt today. Street View
Avalon's Crescent Avenue runs the same white stucco and red tile storefronts under a row of palms, built in the same Spanish and Mediterranean Revival style in the 1920s and 1930s. The scale matches too, two storey shopfronts with apartments or offices above. Avalon sits on a harbor, so a wide shot that drops below the rooflines risks showing boats or water. A frame held on the storefronts and the palms avoids it. Try searching Spanish Revival storefronts now.
Ojai Avenue in Ojai, California
The Arcade on Ojai Avenue works the same Spanish Colonial Revival vocabulary a decade or two earlier, a covered walkway under a tower and a row of round arches over the sidewalk. Mountains close off the street at both ends, the same way they do here. Ojai has oak trees rather than palms, and a wide shot shows the difference right away. The arcade and its arches hold the match better in a tighter frame. Try searching Spanish Colonial arcade now.
