Stop, indeed.

I was on Mount Washington today for a holiday barbecue and couldn't resist snapping this pitiable example of DIY building.

The attempts at embellishment—the staircase window and the tiny fan-light—only make it all the more wrenching.

But it's only wrenching for me. It's likely that the family or families who live here are quite happy, even amid the paucity of style and dearth of imagination. Let's hope they never read Ugly Angel.

Something beautiful . . .

I've been to Piano Bar in Hollywood nearly every Wednesday for the past 2 months years to see West Coast Get Down, featuring the unbelievable Kamasi Washington on sax and several other stellar regulars, including Ryan Porter (trombone), Cameron Graves (piano), Zane Musa (sax) and Tony "Two Fist" Austin (drums). The bassist position is a revolving door that see Miles Mosley (shown in this video), Hadrien Feraud and Carlitos del Puerto show up.



If you live in L.A. and have not ventured out to see these world-class guys (and very frequent guest appearances by stunning visiting artists such as Sheila E.), you are not taking advantage of this amazing city.

See you there.

Weapons of mass germination

I just ordered one of these puppies from Lands' End.

It's not exactly the time of year to do guerrilla planting in Los Angeles, but I'll save the device until the rainy season.

There are several barren patches around here—parkways, median strips, freeway on- and off-ramps, unsuspecting neighbors' front yards—that desperately need an explosive dose of grasses and flowers.

Stay tuned for the photo follow-up. And order your own. Makes a great gift.

PS: If you're wondering, as I was, about why the company is curiously called Lands' End instead of the more correct Land's End: "The misplaced apostrophe in the company name was a typographical error that the founder, Gary Comer, could not afford to change, as promotional materials had already been printed." Thanks, Wikipedia!

Same NIMBYs. Different century.

I recently ran across an old rail industry promotional film called "Railroadin'" that perfectly captures the attitude of those who oppose the California High-Speed Rail project on NIMBY grounds. The costumes have changes, but the grumbling is identical.





As the film points out, those nineteenth-century NIMBYs were swept away by progress, as their contemporary counterparts will be. The full video can be found here.

Still obsessed

I've been obsessed with The Talmadge on Wilshire for a decade now.

I may never live on Park Avenue, but I'm still holding out hope for an apartment at The Talmadge, together with a complete upscale revival of Mid-Wilshire from MacArthur Park to Western. (I can't bring myself to call this corridor "Koreatown," in spite of the city's signage, although I'm willing to concede that moniker to the area just a couple of blocks south and north of Wilshire.)

There's certainly no dearth of Talmadge apartments to be had (they are rentals) and the regularity of vacancies appearing on craigslist.com makes me wonder whether there's not something drastically wrong with the management.

The building is not in the best of shape (how will you look at 90?) , but I would far prefer leaving it as is to giving it over to a conscience-challenged developer to gut and turn into "lofts."

Thank Zeus this hasn't happened yet. Each apartment has a formal dining room, and the galley-style kitchens still have their swinging doors, through which the "help" (some apartments have rooms for live-in maids) might once have bustled out pheasant under glass for a dinner party for six bon-vivants. There are some good things to be said about benign neglect, I suppose. 

I've looked at several one-bedrooms in this building at various points, usually on weekends when the security desk will give "prospective tenants" free access to spend a leisurely hour pretending to live in the Los Angeles of Norma Talmadge, whose husband, producer Joseph Schenk, gave this building to her as a gift.

I snapped a few photos on the last visit, and used that amazing tool Photoshop to whip up a nice little pad for myself along what was once (and still should be) Los Angeles' chicest boulevard.

The renditions are far from perfect, but a guy's gotta dream . . .

 

 Shall we say dinner at 8?

Antigua del Mar Tile

In my previous post, I visited the home of Lorna Auerbach, owner of Antigua del Mar Tile, based in Santa Monica. As promised, here's a look at the artisanal Spanish tiles that she deals in.

A sample board with several patterns.

Antigua del Mar is a consortium of ceramic tile artists with studios throughout Spain—artists that Lorna has sought out on many trips to Andalucia and other regions of Spain.

These are handcrafted tiles, made in the same manner as those created from the 12th through 18th centuries, and using patterns that are historically authentic. Unlike industrially produced high-fire tiles, they exhibit slight variations in pattern from tile to tile, the sign of true hand-craftsmanship.

Many of the tiles she offers are documented in definitive reference books on the topic, such as Alun Graves' Tile and Tilework, published by London's Victoria and Albert Museum.

Lorna used many of the handmade tiles in the design of her Pacific Palisades residence. They are especially effective in the exterior cladding of the Moorish arch windows shown in my previous post.

The tiles used in the photo above.

Spain's seven centuries of Moorish rule, from 711 until 1492 AD, resulted in an abundance of intricate geometric patterns, both rigorous and playful, figurative decoration being forbidden under Islamic law.

But aside from abstract Moorish-influenced designs, Antigua del Mar's Spanish artisans also re-create later figurative works in ceramic, such as this multi-tile plaque. Custom work is also welcome.

Followers of interior design may have noticed Lorna's recent ad in the current March-April issue of Veranda.

While the majority of the artists that Lorna works with are traditionalists, their ranks include some who are using cutting-edge technology to re-create the past. The exquisite marble tile below is cut using a computer-guided laser. The pattern is sharply defined, but variations in the material itself assure that each tile will be absolutely unique.
Contact Lorna at Antigua del Mar at 310-315-9870 or info@antiguadelmartile.com.


Many thanks again to Lorna Auerbach for her generous hospitality in producing this and the previous post.