L.A.'s Past's Vision of the Future: Bradbury Building

WROUGHT METAL RAILINGS frame the staircases and run along the wall, leaving a great wide open space in the middle with which to admire the straight black lines of everything. Ornately patterned, these rails and the open elevators are like the icing atop this century-old building located on 3rd Street and Broadway in LA.

The ceiling is all of glass, and gives the space a natural glow, with the sun bleaching the places where it falls directly. Unlike any building in Los Angeles, the Bradbury Building has a charm that history did not need to add anything to, but even so, its story is as unique as is the architecture.

Mining tycoon Lewis Bradbury fired his original architect, only to hire one of the man’s draftsmen, named George Wyman. Wyman didn’t originally want to take the project, but he and his wife were spiritualists, and decided to try to see what the spirits were telling them to do. According to lore, they were meditating over what was similar to an Ouija board, and they received a message from Wyman’s brother, Mark, who had died at the age of 8, telling him to take on the project. His inspiration for the project was supposedly a science fiction book he had read, that depicted a building in the year 2000. The great irony comes now in the year 2000, when movies like 500 Days of Summer feature the gorgeous building as a model of great architecture in LA history.

-- Kimberly Dennis

(photo caption: steam-powered elevator, the bradbury building

photo credit: pink_fish13, flickr, creative commons)

Downtown Re-mapped

IN YOUR READING for tonight, Norman Klein writes about how downtown L.A. in particular is often used metaphorically in films. I was able to find the opening sequence of this film, Criss Cross (1948) on YouTube, which opens with a really shaky helicopter shot over L.A. which looks like a quaint little village compared to what you see in the Michael Mann clip from Heat.


And this? This is downtown nightlife before the art walk, etc. Looks fun.



-- L.G.

LA Urban Panoramas: A Foreign Feeling

LA? WHERE,
WHEN,
and how?
All I saw was Chinese writing, vacant buildings, and ironically for an auto-dependant city, not one car. The sign on the wall of the Getty Center said, “Los Angeles Urban Panoramic Photographs,” but ‘my’ LA was nowhere in sight. The photographer emphasized the idea of the mini-mall being the major component of the Los Angeles urban landscape. Though I agree with that concept I still couldn’t stomach this dark depiction of the mini-mall. Yes, they are flat, yes they serve no aesthetic purpose what so ever, and yes, they tend to appeal to the consumer in transit, but I thought we were going for Sunset Blvd. and the downtown skyline LA here, not the unspoken for back streets.
When we typically think of the LA mini-mall, we automatically think of the 1950’s, urban sprawl, and middle class suburban dwellers driving into “town” for their variation of errand running. Heaven forbid instead of finding something along the lines of this there be a foreign and unkempt mini-mall, where crime and other deviances can take place. The Los Angeles mini-mall is to be a safe haven, and a sort of one stop shop for the suburban consumers.
None of these black and white photographs said safe. Many of them were not even legible to the average American, as the storefronts pictured were in a different language. Windows were broken, and the stucco walls were cracked. Letters were missing in signs and the scattered potholes in the parking lot made for an unpleasant welcome. And for god sake where are the people? These barren structures lacked any livelihood, very opposite of the Los Angeles we are most comfortable associating with, especially while in a museum. We Angelenos are protective of our “white spot” city, and the images of this exhibit formed a threat against an image we hold dear.
Now, I don’t’ mean to shift so abruptly and reveal a secret alternative side of my emotions on this matter, emotions that in all my disagreeing somehow bring me to a point of relating or even understanding. Before I completely deny these accusations and disassociate Angelinos with the images on that wall, I must ask the question, is this empty and broken depiction on purpose? Are we too like our structures, empty and broken? Come on, we’re Hollywood, we’re Sunset Boulevard and the entertainment capital. Yes there is a traffic issue here and there but it’s all worth it when you realize your stuck on the road next to Tom Cruise for a few hours. In actuality this underbelly realization is true whether we are proud of it or not. The irony of the mini malls today, is they completely contradict these safe havens Los Angeles once built up, at least as far as the ones in the photographs are concerned. If this is the case then the photographer’s dark quiet photographs shed light and spoke volumes on corners Los Angeles has managed to keep under wraps.
There we have it, I have managed to have an ah-ha moment right in the middle of writing this. At first I was turned off by this representation of Los Angeles. I didn’t understand why someone would spend all the money and time it took, only to relay the message that Los Angeles isn’t what we all thought it was. After all the photos of New York City were vibrant and seemingly relevant. It looked like the people in those photographs were on a mission and any distraction would be a set back of one hundred years. Their buildings were just as loud and as meaningful as they were. The colors were bright and the words on the buildings were electronically displayed and moved horizontally across the side of the buildings, making sure to keep a steady pace with the important people walking down below. Why didn’t Los Angeles look meaningful and appealing? In conclusion I have come to the realization that the photographer of the New York panoramas had their best foot forward and quite possibly went for the stereotype went for the stereotype (come on NY you’re not all that important). I cannot deny that it took much more courage for the photographer of the Los Angeles panoramas to give us an LA we might not like or even know was there, and for that I commend her honesty and willingness to show a bit of the cold hard truth.

-- Erin Golightly

(photo credit: top, Zabowski; bottom, OmarOmar, flickr creative commons)

Greetings From Our "Island" -- Again -- Literally

ISLANDS OF LA'S, Ari Keltzky, paid a visit to "class" last week by, well, removing the walls and borders around which we think about the place we occupy. This will begin our deeper discussion about what place means and how we define it.

Some images from our Island, the grassy knoll/median at the entrance of LMU's "Alumni Mall."

Any post-discussion thoughts? Did it alter in any way the way you think about "public" or "private"; space or place? How we define where we are is subjective and powerful, Kletzky suggests . . .

Here we are pondering nostalgia, in the dark, by the light of the crescent moon...











Kletzky has some questions on his blog for you all to ponder (the password is LMU) and we'll talk more in class when you return from break about what thought of the whole enterprise. Also, feel free to post here in the comment area below. Express/exchange.

-- L.G.

(photo credit: yours truly)
-- L.G.

Vanished L.A.: "The Great Room"

"The great room, over one hundred feet in length and seventy-five feet in width, was a sunburst of light. Great crystal chandeliers blazed from a dozen vantage points, while softer and smaller lights were placed along the four sides of the room. ... The perfection and symphony of the great room held the guests spellbound upon their arrival. As the stately ladies and gentlemen entered the salon the pause each made at the threshold as with intense interest they swept the salon with their gaze was noticeable.” (LA Times, October 1911. Grand Opening- Alexandria Hotel)

LIKE MOST people today, I’d be lying if I said that I had had ever heard of the Alexandria Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles, prior to last weekend. Somehow, I had managed to find myself walking past transients, through dark glass doors that opened into the marble lobby of a century’s old Los Angeles hotel. Built in 1906 in its current location, the corner of 5th and Spring St., the hotel, much like the Titanic on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, is a mere ruin of the elegance that it once beheld. There is no flowing red carpet to greet an entrance, no butler to take your bags (or trunks), no shoeshine boy to polish your shoes and there are no Hollywood starlets cascading down wooden stairs.

Today, there are only mere remembrances of the golden age; signed photos of silent movie stars the likes of Greta Garbo, Charlie Chaplin and Humphrey Bogart line faded walls. In 1912, a story in the L.A. Times stated that, “What Union Square was to old New York, what Forty-second street is to the present metropolis, and what the vicinity of the Cort Theater is to San Francisco, the Alexandria mezzanine seems to be to theatrical Los Angeles... Hardly ever does the day pass in which some nationally-known actor or actress does not linger in the low settees or pause at the golden rail, looking down into the lobby below”. During its heyday between 1911 and 1922 the Hotel was the grandest location in all of Los Angeles. It housed a million dollar carpet in the lobby, a world famous stained glass Tiffany Skylight, and the premier Ballroom in the western United States. The ballroom, which came to be known as “The Palm Court”, “The Grand Ballroom” and The “Franco-Italian Dining Room” saw speeches by Presidents William Howard Taft and Woodrow Wilson. It was this room where Paul Whiteman, later to be known as the “Jazz King” got his start in 1919. Charlie Chapman, D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks formed United Artists Pictures there in 1919 also. The staircase of the hotel is rumored to be the staircase famously used in “Gone with the Wind”. Sadly though, with the introduction of the Millennium Biltmore hotel in 1923 the hotel slowly lost its grandeur and faded into memories now since lost. Today the hotel is a near ruin, rooms are boarded closed, nailed shut; the deep red staircase is tattered, the carpets and ornaments long since sold, and the grand ballroom is empty. The rooms that are today available, are rented as low-income apartments. If you’ve any imagination or appreciation for times past and old architecture, I strongly suggest wandering down Spring Street, through glass doors and into the Alexandria. The clash between new and old, while sad, is amazingly beautiful.

-- Greg Boss

(photo credit: Greg Boss)

Vanished L.A.: The Exiles

A FRIEND of mine tugged my coat about this one. The Exiles is a 1960 documentary profiling a Native American community that sprouted up in Bunker Hill in the late 50s early 60s in downtown Los Angeles. The film was a project put together by a USC student and was "lost" for many years until some footage showed up in a sprawling documentary about the region that screened around town a few years ago -- Los Angeles Plays Itself, directed by Thom Anderson. The Exiles, made by Kent Mackenzie, was never released theatrically and by most accounts was never seen in its entirety. Anderson's film led to a search for what was else the Mackenzie family might have had stored away. This was part of the bundle of lost L.A. jewels. Last night you saw Mackenzie's USC thesis film, "Bunker Hill 1956." What follows is the trailer for The Exiles. For any of you curious about the nuances of what L.A. used to be should go out and rent if not own this. A beautiful pause on a moment that was about to pass.

-- L.G.

-- L.G.

Iconic L.A.: Philippe's

IN THE reality-TV culture that we currently live in, so many things can be described as being “LA.” But, the real LA is much more than what the average hipster perceives it to be. It can be found all over this vast, experience-rich city. One such experience can be had at Philippe’s. This 102-year-old restaurant has been representative of my LA for as long as I can remember. And, being that I am only 20-years old, it has been representative of LA, in general, for decades before that. As a child, my mother used to take me to Philippe’s for lunch every time she took me to the eye doctor. I remember sitting in the car during the drive downtown, looking with excitement at all of the murals on the walls of the freeway, thinking about the Chessman cookies Dr. Brown was going to give me after checking my eyes and the delicious Philippe’s French dip and potato salad I would have for lunch shortly thereafter. We’d arrive at Dr. Brown’s office and the anticipation would already be building inside of me. I’d always jump across the threshold of the elevator doors on the way out of the building, ready to go.

The ride to Philippe’s would fly by, and, suddenly, we’d be right outside of that ancient cream and brown building that I thought so fondly of. As a child, I was excited by the sawdust or peanut shells or whatever that stuff is they have all over the floor, kicking it around as I waited in line. There is a certain hustle and bustle about the place reminiscent of some sort of market. To me, Philippe’s has a sort of underground vibe. I’ve always seen it as part restaurant, part market and, only in my mind, possibly a former prohibition-era speakeasy. I’ve always been interested in scandalous things, imagining Philippe’s as a former watering hole for bootlegged alcohol comes at no surprise. Even though the place is just a restaurant, I still have a special attraction to it. Regardless of how many times I have dined there, I still always order a French Dip dipped in au jus with a side of potato salad – nothing beats it.

The roll the dip comes on is flaky and soft all at once, even when dipped in the au jus, and the meat is always tender; the sandwich seems to melt in my mouth. Although this is Philippe’s big-ticket item, their potato salad is amazing as well. I’m not sure what they do to it, but it is my absolute favorite potato salad. Even after 102 years, Philippe’s is still delicious as ever. They don’t change what they do and that is their secret. Maintaining a standard of consistency, they have kept a large following of customers coming back time and time again. My grandparents used to take my parents to Philippe’s, my parents, in turn, have taken my brothers and I to Philippe’s, and I will, without a doubt, take my children to Philippe’s one day as well. It is a place that I will always see as LA, and, for many Angelenos, the feeling is forever mutual.

-- Michael Magdesian

(photo caption: philippe's, "the" french dip
photo credit: jason lam, flickr creative commons)

Iconic L.A.: Angel's Flight

CLOSED FOR nearly a decade after a German tourist died in an rail-related accident, Angel Flight, literally rises again. Today marks it's first day open to the public since 2001. The funicular, which rises up Bunker Hill connected the Broadway entertainment and business corridor to the "Hill." According to Kevin Roderick's site, L.A. Observed "Let's return to the days when the funicular originally called the Los Angeles Incline Railway was an integral part of Downtown life. Passengers paid a penny (later a nickel) to ride Olivet and Sinai between 3rd and Hill streets and the neighborhood of hotels and rooming houses on Bunker Hill." His full post relating the history of the two rail cars, Olivet and Sinai, that scale the steep grade and boast a mix of Arcadian and Utopian views of Los Angeles here.

The above piece, called "Angels Flight," was painted in 1931, by artist and architect Millard Sheets, a Claremont native. Sheets reinterpreted many L.A. street-scapes and this one hangs at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. You don't need a Way-back machine when you have these. This is John Fante's L.A.

-- L.G.

illustration credit: LACMA Collections Online

The Glory of Getting Lost is Finding Your Way Around

“GET LOST on purpose.” The funny thing is that when Mike Sonksen came to speak to our class, it wasn’t the first time that I had heard those words. I actually had interviewed someone for the profile piece whose stories were about nights planned with an open-ended agenda. Up until the last weekend of February this idea seemed so dangerous and would have been one of the last things I would do.

I spent the weekend showing a friend of mine the city of Los Angeles. He attends the University of Michigan and is originally from Wisconsin, so coming here to California was a first for him. Our only big plan was seeing the LA Philharmonic and some project bands at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. We intended for the rest of the weekend to be random, but nothing beat that Friday night.

Before the show started, the two of us were walking through the venue and my friend ran into a colleague of his from Michigan. He lives close to the hall so we asked him where he recommended eating after the show. He replied one word: Wurstkuche.

Driving down 3rd and Alameda, I thought to myself that this would never be an area that I would drive through—especially at that hour and just for a hot dog; something didn’t seem right. We had no idea where we were going but after a few minutes of driving it didn’t matter. The spontaneity was enticing and the mixing of nervous and exciting feelings cancelled out any fear I had for being out of my element.

If it weren’t for this moment, I probably would have never known about the existence of such an eccentric eatery: The five-year-standing, dimly-lit venue filled with people, ranging from the early 20s to early 70s, sitting and standing around long tables that stretched across the room. Belgian beers lined the bar in one corner and a DJ was mixing beats and playing popular songs in the other. The eccentricity of the place was overwhelming.

Even though the restaurant blew my mind, nothing was more mind boggling than the idea that I had actually thrown myself, willingly, into a different idea. It used to sound like the most challenging thing to do, but I’ve come to realize it’s not so bad.

-- Antoinette Ochoa