When L snagged a Crystal Cove cottage 6 months ago for this past weekend, I had no idea that it happened to be the weekend of the annual Christmas tree lighting and visit from Santa! So not only did we enjoy unexpectedly clear, sunny weather, we had a celebration to enjoy footsteps from the cottage. And the cottage, #16 Sand Castle, is now one of my favorites. Perfect for the 4 of us – P, C and L – who called it home for 2 days.
Since I’ve now stayed there more times than I can count, I won’t do my usual write-up of the experience. Instead, I’ll share the 5 haiku that I was inspired to write and that I used for facebook status updates along with their accompanying pictures.
Is there greater joy
than waking up with coffee
watching pelicans?
Christmas at the beach -
Never do I want to leave.
Occupy the Cove.
Carolers bring cheer
Santas helper also does…
ah, So Cal Christmas.
Santa Claus arrives.
Children join him – Ho Ho Ho!
Merry Christmas, all!
Dolphins play and swim
past me as I sit and smile.
Goodbye, Crystal Cove.
Tags: Crystal Cove, holidays
Each year on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, the streets of Hollywood are lined with spectators who watch the bands, floats and balloons and hope to catch a glimpse of Santa. The Hollywood Christmas Parade began back in 1928 when the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce created it as a way to woo holiday shoppers. It even served as the inspiration for the song “Here Comes Santa Claus”, as it was originally known as the Santa Claus Lane parade. Entertainer Gene Autry composed the song in 1946 after participating in the parade and hearing the shouts of children eager for the arrival of Santa
I don’t know why I’ve never made it to the Hollywood Christmas parade, but with L’s building on Sunset + Vine offering a prime viewing spot, I vowed to catch it this year. We didn’t know what to expect – would we have to snag a space hours in advance? Turns out we didn’t have to worry. Though a few die hards claimed their street spots around 3, most didn’t appear until after 5. And the hipsters who comprise the bulk of L’s neighbors didn’t show much intere
st in a holiday parade for kids. So we had prime seats largely to ourselves – much better than the legwork required for the Rose Parade!
True to its name, the parade boasted many celebrities, most of whom weren’t very well known and were hawking their TV shows. But it also featured grand marshal Marie Osmond, LaToya Jackson, Mark Ballas and some other better-known celebs. We were located right across from one of the “Tinseltown Stages”, and the entertainer there gave colorful commentary and interviewed the various celebrities when they drove by.
The parade had a little bit of everything: the bands were great, and it was fun that they featured holiday music. The equestrians were great to watch, and they showcased the dancing Peruvian paso horses. Even New York didn’t have anything on Hollywood, for the large balloons that made their way down the route – including Elmo, Rudolf, and the Grinch – were every bit as impressive as those in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade.
The tradition almost ended in 2007, when the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce called it quits. But the city stepped in, and though people say it’s lost some of its shine, I wasn’t any wiser. It was still a great show. Here’s hoping the parade continues to delight for many more years to come.
Call me crazy, but somehow when the Saturday before Thanksgiving rolls around, I find myself itching to walk across Los Angeles. Fortunately, the Great LA Walk also happens to be at that time, and I’ve joined them on 3 of the 6 walks that have taken place. This year I was happy to be joined by 7 friends, and we walked 19.5 miles from City Hall in Downtown LA to the beach in Santa Monica. Charles Phoenix provided the opening remarks to get us in the spirit, and even provided some explanation for the wacky Triforium that marked the start of our route. I was glad he made an appearance, for it reminded me that I had wanted to see his holiday slide show last year and didn’t buy tickets in time. His presence allowed me to avoid that fate again and am looking forward to the Holiday Retro Slide Show on December 18.
The cool thing about the Great LA Walk that you can make it what you want it to be. It’s not an architectural tour – but it can be. It’s not a way to keep fit – but it can be. It’s not an opportunity to spend 8 hours talking to your friends or a chance to meet new people – but it can be. For me, it wound up being all of the above.
There’s no way I can write about everything I saw and did en route. But this year almost everyone was on board with technology, and so it was fun to witness the walk from a mobile perspective – including tweets and check ins. The event unfolded with people leaving a virtual trail along the route, and connecting physically and in cyberspace. So I’m including some screen grabs from twitter and foursquare that comprise part of my historical record of Great Walk 2011. (OK, so I didn’t set foot in all the buildings – I still scored over 150 points without even trying, including my first Thai massage…)
When you cover almost 20 miles in a day, it’s very hard to stop and smell the roses – or to see the buildings. But there were some pretty incredible ones along the way. In fact, I calculate that there were over a dozen Historic Cultural Monuments directly en route, including the Hollywood Western Building, once home to the censors at the MPAA (and where the figures on the building are ironically uncensored). I am bummed that it is HCM #336, which means it was not covered by the awesome Big Orange Landmarks blog, which is no longer updated regularly. I also was surprised that the monolithic Ame
rican Storage Company, which once boasted a top floor speakeasy, is not designated as an HCM. It always strikes me as a misplaced monument from another world. We sadly gave barely a glance to other cool buildings, including the Pantages Theatre and the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel; there just wasn’t enough time. And even if there had been, there were many cool watering holes along the way, and we couldn’t even stop for those.
Locanda del Lago was the site of the afterparty. While it wasn’t ideal in terms of allowing all of the participants to congregate and celebrate together, our little group enjoyed a well-earned dinner of pizza and wine. We then all hobbled back to our cars to find our respective ways home. This year I feel a bit more worn that in previous years, but it’s not enough to keep me from putting Great LA Walk 2012 on the calendar.
More write-ups via the LAist.
Tags: Great LA Walk
Michael Rubel had the childhood many a young boy dreams of. Growing up in the small San Gabriel Valley town of Glendora in the 1940s, he had orchards to play in, and even an old reservoir to swim in. On the citrus ranch of Al Bourne, he and his friends built fort after elaborate fort out of scraps. But while most boys move on to other things, Michael didn’t. In fact, he wound up buying the land from Bourne, along with a packing house and some out buildings, and just kept on building. The reservoir was drained and with a few openings cut out, became the foundation for the castle walls. Rubel became a school bus driver, which allowed plenty of opportunity to pick up rocks from nearby San Gabriel Canyon and haul them back to the site. His gregarious personality endeared him to others, and so he didn’t have to search when in need of materials or labor.
Early Photo with reservoir and packing house visible
The result, 25 years in the making, is a place I’ve wanted to visit ever since I heard about it almost 3 years ago: Rubel Castle. And today, all the pieces came in place for a visit.
Rubel died in 2007, and the property is now owned and managed by the Glendora Historical Society. They offer tours to the public on the 2nd Tuesday and 3rd Friday of each month. D and I just happened to have this particular Friday off. And so we headed up to Glendora.
When we entered the gate off of Live Oak Drive, we saw a massive stone building, complete with towers and portcullis. This was indeed a castle! But on closer inspection, the walls weren’t just made of stone. There were bottles and other bits of junk interspersed – even an old motorcycle and vacuum cleaner. Rubel had kept building his forts from junk he found; they were just more structurally sound.
Today, the reservoir is "filled in" with the castle!
We spent two hours on a guided tour of the property, and it was fun to take it all in. Huell Howser visited with Rubel back in the 90s and created a video. We took 12 minutes to watch it on site, and it was great to get a sense of Michael Rubel while surrounded by his creation. Unbeknownst to us, Howser had just made a follow up visit, so the castle is getting a surge in visitors at the moment. There are 5 residents still living on site; they help maintain and watch over the property.
Although the castle is the star attraction, the other buildings are worth seeing in their own right. The “Tin Palace” packing house was where his mother, a former Ziegfield girl, gave elaborate parties for her Hollywood friends amongst the random collectibles. President Eisenhowser even visited there. Our tour guide pointed out how many of the motors, pumps and other machines still work. We even got a demo of the old Victrola.
Another great “building” was the old caboose on site. A walk through it was a walk through time, and it was neat to see the quarters of the railroaders. The property also featured a graveyard – no one is buried here, but scavenger Rubel got some discarded grave markers and put them to good use.
The property is known for its 1896 Seth Thomas clock housed in one of the towers. Originally slated to be installed in Rochester, New York, it instead was purchased for Rubel by a friend and today sounds its chimes at noon and 6. Sadly it was being worked on, so we didn’t hear it, nor were we around for the train whistle that also sounds the noon hour. Those are both featured, however, in Howser’s video, which is worth watching. And once you do, pay a visit to the castle itself!
Tags: Architecture, Wacky LA
Some of LA’s most enjoyable surprises can be found at its great collection of 99-seat theaters. Without really realizing it, I’ve found myself on a journey to discover each of them. Last evening I visited the Black Dahlia Theatre for the first time to take in a performance of Hey Morgan! It’s a musical written and performed by the son of one of my friend’s co-workers. And while that may have been the incentive to lure me in, I found myself loving both the venue and the show very much.
I’ve never entered a theater via the stage before. Yet that’s what happened when we received our programs and entered the theater from the lobby. Instead of facing the stage, we were on it, staring at the already-assembled audience. We quickly located our seats and settled in. 99 seats is a stretch for this place – they advertise 30. So it was an incredibly intimate experience to be in the front row, literally able to reach out and touch the performers.
Earlier in the day I checked to see if anything had been written about the performance, and I was excited to come across the enthusiastic reviews. It was truly a fun-filled hour, filled with catchy numbers and interesting characters. And while the plot wasn’t much, the concept was quite engaging. I was most impressed by the non-stop action, with two of the actors seamlessly switching roles throughout. As with [title of show], I was amazed at what a small and extremely talented cast could pull off in this type of space. I was especially impressed by the work of said friend’s co-worker’s son, Isaac, who not only collaborated on the script and music, but performed on stage as the guitar-playing narrator. Within our program was a CD of the performance, which I think is a great way for the audience to relive the moment and share the word with others. It’s still playing for another month, so check it out while you can.
Tags: theatre
I see it’s been almost a month since the last post. It’s not that I haven’t been busy. Indeed, the past 4 weeks have seen me in Lassen Volcanic National Park, Chicago, and Orlando. But I haven’t spent much time in LA. That dry spell ended today when I decided to spend the morning downtown and take an LA Conservancy tour.
The day began with a great cuppa joe at Coffee Bar, still one of my favorite coffee spots. In addition to wonderful hand-poured bliss, it offers great people-watching. Today, as I sat next to celebrity chef Ilan Hall, I watched the changing of the urban guard, as homeless people yielded the sidewalks to dog-walkers and stroller-pushers.
I chose the Conservancy’s Historic Downtown tour, because it’s frankly one of the few that I haven’t taken. All of my tour guides have been amazing, and today’s guide, David, was no exception. Personable and knowledgeable, he spent 2 hours showing us how LA’s unique history shaped the city’s growth and its architecture. I’d recommend this as the first tour anyone should take, as it shows a variety of architectural styles from the 1890s to 1930s. For me, it reinforced some concepts introduced on other tours, as well as showcased some new buildings and spaces.
As with most of the Saturday tours, it began in Pershing Square. With this one, however, we spent a few minutes to dig deeper into the history of the park and its various incarnations. I much prefer the square of the 1920s – a beautiful Beaux Arts space reminiscent of the parks of Paris. In 1952 the city dug it up to put in a parking garage underneath, and through most of the rest of the century, it looked more like the space behind the Hall of Administration. Suffering from neglect, it got its latest facelift in the 90s, by noted Mexican landscape architect Ricardo Legorreta. I appreciate his attempt to bring elements of LA’s history along with bold colors to the space. But I don’t think it works.
This tour took us by and through the Pacific Mutual building (Pacific Center). Home to the Conservancy today, it was originally the headquarters of a company founded by 3 of the 4 big railroad magnates: Stanford, Crocker and Hopkins. We focused on the grand entrance, featuring 2 Greco-Roman figures and a redwood tree, the symbol of the company. Architect John Parkinson turned out to be the star of this tour; in additional to designing this building, he designed the deco Title Guarantee and Trust building and a renovation of Pershing Square, both featured on the tour.
Another featured stop was the LA Public Library. David described its influence on the birth of the LA Conservancy: damaged by both earthquakes and arson attempts, this wonderful structure was once slated for destruction. But through leadership of some preservation-minded individuals and a $125 million infusion of funds acquired by selling its air rights to the US Bank Tower , the library’s continued existence was assured. David explained that the mission of the conservancy is not strictly preservation – they recognize that cities change. So the organization focuses on facilitating that change in a positive way by developing awareness of the city’s rich past. Successes in areas like adaptive reuse help to retain the legacy of the past as the city continues to grow.
We didn’t go in the library, but we explored the way the architect, Bertram Goodhue told the stories of learning through sculpture and architecture. Years later, the developers of the neighboring Marguire Gardens did something similar in using landscape architecture to tell the story of the evolution of writing. I enjoyed seeing how the detail of the stair treads told this story, starting with early glyphs and graduated to modern forms of writing, including Braille and computer code.
We crossed the street to the One Bunker Hill building. I had visited this in my Art Deco tour, so I won’t describe the detail again. However, since I had just visited Chicago and taken the Architectural Foundation’s Art Deco Tour, it was neat to reflect on how this building incorporated many of the features we explored on that tour. For one, we saw the celebration of the technologies of the modern area, in this case, of power and electricity. We saw the use of setbacks — here, more the “wedding cake” style used in New York rather than the armchair style of Chicago. David even showed us the use of “booking” in the marble, which I had seen great examples of in Chicago’s Field Building. The introduction of machines to cut stone and perform other work allowed for the introduction of such features into the style. The lobby has a nice exhibit on the history of the building and its style, reminding us that the term “Art Deco” wasn’t even coined until almost 40 years later. I had learned in Chicago that at the time these structures were built, they were done in the “Modern Style”.
We later visited the Subway Terminal Building, and got a peek inside of the lobby. One of the most interesting stories on the tour came from a building that is no longer there: the Philharmonic Auditorium. Instead of this great space, we’ve had a parking lot on the site for 40 years – the building was torn down without plans for replacement. One thing I appreciate about the Conservancy is that they learn from these past losses, like that of the Richfield Tower. In the case of the Philharmonic Auditorium, they are working to ensure that before a permit is issued for demolition, there are building plans in place for the replacement.
Our tour continued to the Grand Central Market, past the Million Dollar Theatre, and into the Bradbury Building. One of the new sights for me was the Angel’s Flight Railway; I’d been wanting to ride this for years, but it seems like it was always closed when I was nearby. David told of its role in LA’s past, when the bankers lived in the mansions of Bunker Hill and commuted down the hill via the railway to their workplaces on Spring Street. The sad decline of the homes on Bunker Hill proved to be to the benefit of the old buildings on Spring Street. For instead of tearing those buildings down to build skyscrapers, the businesses took advantage of redevelopment incentives on Bunker Hill and relocated to new skyscrapers there. As a result, Spring Street was largely ignored for 40 years and therefore preserved.
2 hours later, the tour ended, and all of us left with a much better sense of how Los Angeles evolved as a city – and how it continues to evolve. Hungry and tempted by the quick stroll through the Grand Central Market, I returned for a tostada and ceviche at Lupita’s. And then I finally had my chance to take Angel’s Flight. Boarding the Olivet down on Hill Street, I felt like I stepped back 100 years. The wooden seats and bare light bulbs of the interior made me feel more like one of those old Bunker Hill commuters. The car then lurched into motion and I found myself really hoping as it shuddered up the hill that the problems that plagued the system in prior years had been resolved.
But I made it to the top without incident and was treated to a panoramic view of the historic downtown. It was a fitting way to conclude one of LA’s best history tours.
Tags: Architecture, LA Conservancy
