Remember when Santa Monica was cute? Quaint, charming, full of old-world delight? Good thing voters elected Queen Anne-hating cultural terrorists, or someone might have had to look at a charming old building.
Pico Palace, a 1939 Art Deco bowling alley designed by master architect William Douglas Lee, sits just west of Crescent Heights at 6081 West Pico — and it's about to hit the landfill.
A 1912 California bungalow at 6315 South Brynhurst in Hyde Park — front porch, heritage trees, backyard for an orange tree — is exactly the kind of house a YIMBY loves to hate. And demolish.
Before the Victorians of West Adams get all the attention, someone should record the Art Deco structures that once dotted Baldwin Hills — those cool old buildings you'd spot from the car and say 'hey, that's neat.' Used to.
An update on the ownership mystery surrounding Marilyn Monroe's former Brentwood home — a striking 1929 Spanish house at 12305 Fifth Helena Drive with a demolition permit and a very secretive new owner.
In the stately pines of Los Feliz sits an elegant 1907 home at 1820 North Berendo. Single-family homes, of course, must be destroyed — so says the City of Los Angeles.
The 2600 block of South Magnolia is a festival of two-story Edwardians, each more magnificent than the last — a rare surviving streetscape of old Los Angeles. For now.
A 1936 Hollywood Regency home in Westwood — graceful, elegant, irreplaceable — is being erased for a 56-foot, 11-unit multifamily. Senator Wiener assures us this is better for the environment.
Bundy's Lock & Key has called South Sawtelle home since 1947 — and the building itself predates 1905. Both the beloved business and its pre-Victorian structure are headed to the landfill.
RIP Los Angeles returns after an 18-month absence — the demolitions didn't stop, the City didn't develop a sane policy, and Nathan is back with thirty posts in thirty days to prove it.
Nathan Marsak returns to RIP Los Angeles after an absence — having been 'abducted by evil developers' — to find the destruction of Los Angeles's architectural heritage very much ongoing.
Where the story goes sideways is all on our end. The Office of Historic Resources was given materials by the developer with which to determine the validity of painting over the eighty-year-old sign.
Which, to be correct, is not truly a ghost sign, as it _still_ advertises the famed, magnificent Hotel Cecil. It is the grandest of our great painted palimpsests, originally added to the wall in 1924
I revere the Catholic faith. I believe the Church to have had a vastly civilizing influence on humanity, as society now considers statue destruction and church burning the ideal Sunday outing.
So, it’s been a while here at RIP Los Angeles. Is that because the Powers That Be stopped tearing down everything that makes Los Angeles special? Certainly not. In fact, the opposite. We’ve watched
You know, not everything is about the demolition of our built environment in toto. (Like, say, [the razing of an entire Whittlesey Sometimes it’s more subtle. Over in Highland Park, there’s a house.
There’s a very special part of the world. Beverly Boulevard. You go ahead and cross town on (shudder) the freeways; or traverse the city on, Santa Monica (bless your heart); I go in for cruising Bever
I am forever fascinated by GrowLA’s. They are first-tier density cheerleaders, fervently committed to tearing down any and all Los Angeles and replacing it with vast swaths of multi-units.
Can’t believe it’s been nigh on four months since I’ve posted. I must beg your forgiveness—in September we birthed the Bunker Hill book with Angel City Press thereafter doing lots of publicity, while
Say you’re living peacefully in your vintage home on your block of gracious low-slung craftsmans when some developer decides to tear down the house next door to put something grossly out-of-scale