terra non firma

I have to brag

2007-07-13T11:41:00.000-07:00

I barely blog here anymore and when I finally do, its to brag. shame on me. but while this week has been somewhat horrific work-wise, (and I will post some of that story to curbed because its real estate related), and the gods of technology have seen fit to punish me multiple times (goodbye 5 years of email!), the gods of free stuff have been kind.

first, hilary offered to take me with her to the dodgers game next week against the mets. my hometown team. I grew up about 10 min from shea, yet my allegiance is to the yankees. my first few baseball games, though, were all mets games. the '86 world series still looms large in my childhood memories.

then, OP discovered how to get free tickets to the groove armada show at the standard downtown on tues and we were able to snag a few.

and finally, while not free, highly coveted: reservations at osteria mozza for next week. eater was able to get thru the always-busy reservation line and get a table for two. and I barely had to threaten, cajole and beg to be her plus one. suck on that, batali.

and just to tie this into the LA arch theme of this blog - I'm docenting this sat at the schindler house from 11am until 2ish.

best goatse yet

2007-06-28T16:20:00.001-07:00

Originally uploaded by tradica

habitat 825 - almost done

2007-06-11T22:02:00.000-07:00

the latest pics of lorcan o'herlihy's habitat 825. its been a while since I've posted but you can see the entire flickr photoset here.

the facade is looking pretty good, right?

but the side adjacent to the schindler house - well, that's a different story.

paris hilton doesn't shop here

2007-06-11T21:47:00.001-07:00

just one of the reasons I like culver city.

waaaay too long

2007-05-14T19:38:00.000-07:00

I can't believe I haven't updated this blog for a month. how does that happen? I've been pretty active on curbed, but this poor blog has been neglected. so what has been going on?

in the past month have been to san francisco, boston, and am now in ny, having left LA the day the griffith park fires erupted. its been years since I had been to SF and I forgot how much I like that city. I could never live in a city that requires so much walking uphill and is so unfriendly to heels, but I still love it. I stayed near the moscone center and union square in a charming, very small hotel called the mosser. I found it online and had never been, but it was a very good refurb of an old victorian building. and in just 3 days I managed to make my way over to the mission/potrero hill for an npr interview, to china basin for some meetings, and to japantown for omakase. final verdict: LA has SF's sushi beat. perhaps its unfair to judge by one restaurant, but I still have yet to find sushi outside LA that is even on par with your typical strip mall joint in LA.

and boston. more specifically, I was in cambridge for a conference. it felt very much like london. it was april but drizzling and cold and cambridge has an interesting mix of mainly industrial architecture, with a touch of the collegiate. I spent most of my time on the MIT campus, which is a bit soulless. I didn't get over to the crazy Frank Gehry Stata Center, regrettably. but my hotel was just a hop skip and a jump from Steven Holl's Simmons Hall, a building apparently inspired by a bath sponge. and possible a prison. in space? of course, it photographs well, but just looked so completely out of context as it sits forlornly overlooking a soccer field, surrounded by...nothing.

image from flickr cityofsound

and new york. now I'm in ny and was able to proudly watch my little sister receive her MD last week. so this past week has mostly been consumed by family, and hasn't left much time for other stuff. unfortunately, the cooper hewitt has the same exhibition they had the last time I was in town, so my sister and I will need to find an alternative to our usual musuem excursion. tomorrow, however, lunch is at lupa with LA friends who are kindly making an exception to their "no socializing with LA friends while in NY rule." its the power of batali to bring people together.

habitat 825 - belated update

2007-04-14T09:48:00.000-07:00

ok, so I took these pictures of habitat 825 over a month ago, but finally got around to uploading them to flickr and even creating a set, so you can see the construction progress over the last 2 years. the condos should be ready for occupancy by may 31st. it seems like they were just breaking ground yesterday. ah, memories.

salk institute

2007-04-09T21:20:00.000-07:00

I finally got around to uploading my photos from my new digital camera to flickr. so I can finally post some photos from my unsuccessful attempt to visit the salk institute. behold! the exterior only.

random bits

2007-03-29T09:46:00.000-07:00

its been way too long since I've posted here. and yet my traffic seems to be rising prodigiously, mostly due to international traffic. so welcome, all my non-American readers. yet I will still try to keep this focused on LA as much as I can. so what's new?

going to CA Boom 4 this weekend. the organizers have very kindly offered curbed LA press passes again this year. last year I skipped most of the home tours and the party. this year josh and I are going to both the party and some tours on sunday, as well as the show itself. will be bringing my new digital cam to take some pix for the site, and hopefully will post a few here as well.
went to a panel discussion and performance by ozomatli on tuesday, as a guest of the lear center. (this is my week of free stuff apparently). I mention that here because most of the discussion related to the impact of los angeles, and their sense of place, on their music. while I wish they were slightly more articulate about the band's relationship to this city, the way they recombine and fuse diverse musical influences, and the role a band can play in the fight for social justice, ultimately I have to remember, they're musicians. they're already worlds ahead of the pablum most mainstream musicians spew. they're closer in spirit to musicians turned politicians like gilberto gil than to musicians turned messiah like Bono. and they put on a great show at usc.
first resolution of 2007 is completed: I am now fully caught up in Battlestar Galactica. I was a little underwhelmed by the first season after all the hype, but seasons 2 and 3 really drew me in. its the smartest show on TV right now. now I am spending my time evangelizing BSG to john, who seems to believe allegory is somehow less important, less capable of eliciting genuine emotional responses than watching CNN. he's so misguided.
I just booked some travel in april for a couple of conferences I'm speaking at: adtech in SF and the media in transition conference in MIT (those MIT kids are so smart! the conference initials and the school are the same). I left the travel plans for almost last min so I was forced to look for a nearby hotel in SF that was reasonably priced and I'm actually kind of pleased with my find: the mosser. granted, I haven't been there yet but its a 1913 victorian building that's recently been renovated so it looks like an interesting fusion on modern and victorian touches. and I can also pat myself on the back for another reason: The Mosser family donates a portion of hotel proceeds to their non-profit dedicated to the reforestation of the rain forest. its been literally years since I've been to SF, so I'm looking forward to the trip.
and finally, curbed LA is running its Ugliest Building in LA contest. Its a contest born from josh's twisted head one random monday when our comments seemed low. apparently necessity and low comments are the mother of invention. but the submissions are starting to come in fast and furious now - everyone has a favorite most-hated building. our judges are christopher hawthorne from the latimes, lorcan o'herlihy, alissa walker from unbeige, and ryan from losanjealous . judging begins next week - can't wait.

reason number 347 I'm a total nerd

2007-03-17T08:08:00.001-07:00

the other day, I sent an email to james howard kunstler asking him to judge Curbed LA's ugliest building in LA contest and possibly contribute some eyesores to LA. while his schedule doesn't really allow him to judge the contest (although he might contribute some eyesores of his own), he sent me a really lovely email, that was quite complimentary about curbed. so I will treasure that email forever and ever.

after spending last weekend contemplating the state of contemporary suburbia in orange county, this weekend is shaping up to be slightly more urbane. olga and I attended the genart party last night. we also went to the fall party several months ago in santa monica. while I love last night's warehouse space in hollywood (it feels very brooklyn), its a tough space for a fashion show, since it lacks a runway. so rather than have a runway show, they set up individual tableaux for each designer. the problem with that is a) I'm too short to see anything and b) clothes at rest = kind of boring. clothes in motion = far more dynamic.

today I have my docenting duties at the schindler house - which I nearly forgot about it until last night. which meant I had to cancel yoga and brunch plans. The sacrifices we make for the architects we love. oh well. speaking of schindler, he got some major press this week and both the nytimes and the new yorker. the articles weren't about him per se but he got some major new york press coverage, nonetheless.

tonight there are plans afoot to make it to some of the chinatown gallery openings, but I suspect we'll never make it in time, since john and jack have arranged a dinner for 20 of their closest friends at a thai restaurant. fingers crossed, it won't be a 3 hour dinner.

my return to orange county tits

2007-03-09T16:01:00.000-08:00

spring break just began at USC, so to celebrate (kinda) a few of us are heading down to san clemente for the weekend. hey, some people spend their spring break in cabo or cancun with drunk co-eds and senor frog. and some of us decide to spend it with rich white golf-playing republicans adjacent to a nuclear power plant. to each their own.

I mock orange county but weekends in SC are very relaxing since they're spent at the beach and at the grill, even if overall I feel a strange sense of discomfort every time I cross the county line. and despite the presence of the strange nuclear boobs, the beaches there are actually pretty lovely. the question I am now facing: do I take my students' midterm papers with me and grade them while I'm down there or do I act irresponsibly and leave them at home?

cnbc didn't cut me

2007-03-07T08:59:00.000-08:00

I was on cnbc this morning talking about microsoft's marketing strategy - and of course, they chose the worst part of my interview to air. damn. at least this time I wasn't cut - I did an interview last week that I dont think ever aired because of the dow dropping 500 points. imagine that, I got bumped just because the stock market had the worst one day drop since 9/11. whatevs. I had very important opinions on sony blu-ray that the world should hear.! oh well, now you'll never know what I think of sony's strategy to drop the price on their blu-ray players. so sad.

about 'about alice'

2007-02-28T15:14:00.001-08:00

I'm still not sure I can read fiction, even historical fiction, as I slog through gore vidal's Lincoln. Its no fault of vidal's, its my own failings with fiction that have slowed me down.

I did, however, take a brief respite from lincoln, for about an hour this morning, to read about alice by calvin trillin, his beautiful and eloquent eulogy for his wife. its the yin to joan didion's yang. but rather than write a meditation of the process of grief, he writes a funny, loving portrait of his wife who died on Sept 11, 2001 from cardiac complications precipitated by her treatment for cancer 25 years earlier. its romantic in the best way - a way that is not at all saccharine or overly sentimental, but always adoring.

and after you read it, read some of his interviews about writing the book, which started as a piece for - what else? - the new yorker:

Q: Is it a little odd, to be a famous funny-guy writer talking about such a solemn subject so close to your own heart?

A: Yes, I was concerned about the book tour, whether I wanted to do it at all. My daughters were a little concerned, too.

Originally, I wasn't going to answer questions, just read. But I began at a friendly bookstore not far from my neighborhood in New York, and found I could answer questions OK. I've had moments where I've had to stop and sort of collect myself, but all in all it's been fine.

The hard part's when I get questions that I don't know anything about, like about making a good marriage. I can't believe people are actually good or bad at it. I think mainly you just meet the right people. It's not satisfying to people to tell them that luck has a lot to do with it, but in fact I think it's true.

So that's my advice: Wander into the right party. Just that. It's like the advice I give about childrearing: Try to get one that doesn't spit up. The rest is up to you.

salk institute: bite me

2007-02-26T21:12:00.000-08:00

I know its been a long time since I posted here (but keeping up my blogging duties on curbed). I entertained family from new york for a week - which was interesting since I've never really had to figure out how to entertain kids in LA. turns out, not so difficult since this entire city is an amusement park. the hits: venice boardwalk, hiking in runyon, sushi ike (my cousins may be 9 and 11 but they know good sushi when they see it), and the getty center. misses: universal studios (which I thankfully missed since I was teaching that day), and fred segal (because they didn't spot any celebrities).

as soon as they left, I had to go down to San Diego to speak at a conference saturday morning. I thought I'd take advantage of my proximity to la jolla and stop by the salk institute. I was erroneously informed that even if they were closed, they'd probably let me in. oh how wrong I was. I begged. I pleaded. I just wanted to take pics of the courtyard, I didn't want to go inside. the security guard was unconvinced. I was able to use the restroom, with an escort, and I have a feeling that was only bc the empire waist dress I was wearing makes me look pregnant. they're not completely heartless, you see. so san diego was a bust. sure the conference went well, but that was a whole lot of driving to NOT see a building I've been meaning to see for years.

it was also my birthday this weekend. my family kindly bought me a new digital camera and once I figure out how to download my pics, I will post the photos I took of the salk institute from the side of the road. how sad. how lonely. how dejected I must have looked.

the rest of the birthday weekend consisted of korean bbq, korean bars, chinese hot pot, and bashing bad oscar dresses. almost perfect, had one single security guard taken pity on my pouting. I should have just rushed the courtyard in my 4 inch heels.

I could have taken him.

Synthetic Ecologies

2007-02-06T16:10:00.000-08:00

I'm going to be speaking at the DIY convention on sat, but if I wasn't, I'd probably be attending this:

In landmark exhibition The Gen(H)ome Project, veteran architects explore the conceptual edge of design and technology. Held in conjunction with that show, today's panel considers the further implications of blending architecture and science. (SND)

schindler and scouts

2007-02-06T11:59:00.000-08:00

on friday I gave a group tour at the schindler house to a group of girl scouts earning their architecture badges. I had no idea the girl scouts offer architecture badges, but there you have it. a group of 11-13 year old at the schindler house - a house that is challenging to understand as an adult, but they loved it. they were attentive, enthusiastic, asked me better questions than most tourists, and they LOVED the sleeping baskets. I dont know how much camping the girls do - I was never a girl scout - but they seemed to really love the concept of a house as a permanent campsite. living most of your life outdoors, sleeping on the roof, cooking on an open fire.

then today I received this great email from their group leader (who is also an architect):

The girl scouts LOVED the tour of the house. They are really excited about architecture and are going to design their own dream room.

Thanks again

made my day.

dios mio! miami is COLD

2007-01-30T13:38:00.000-08:00

I may have to rethink my previous prejudices against miami. sure, it has a euro-trash vibe, most of the neighborhoods suck, and it can be humid, but I have to give credit where credit is due. I'm staying in the art deco historic district, which has lovingly restored and preserved the architectural integrity of many of these amazing buildings. south beach is walkable. the stone crabs and key lime pie are great (and good for celebrity sightings during super bowl week, if dan marino, chris carter, and fat joe count as celebrities to you. most surreal celebrity moment yet: watching dan marino "rap" Lean Back to fat joe. white men in their 50's should never rap.)

so I need to amend my anti-miami stance. its a great city for 3-4 days. any longer than that and I think I would go crazy. weirdly, its quite cold here right now, so I left cold and rainy LA for...cold and rainy miami.

sadly, I forgot my camera in LA, but flickr means never having to bring a camera. behold, the beauty that is LA's art deco district, so very different from LA's art deco (or new york's, or chicago's, or london's, etc etc):

beinvenido a miami

2007-01-26T16:59:00.000-08:00

I'm going to miami next week for all of two days to speak at a conference - a decision I'm now regretting. not the trip to miami, the fact that I booked it for so little time. but I have work and responsibilities back in LA, and a class to teach at USC, so I didn't think I could spare the time. and I keep reminding myself, I don't really like miami. any city that makes LA look classy, is not the city for me. plus, I hate humidity. my hair does too.

now I realize I should have just gone down there for the weekend and at least enjoyed some cubans and crabs (the food, not the lice). and most of all, the art deco. now that I did the LA art deco tour, I should have booked a little extra time in a city renowned for their art deco district. fortunately, at least my hotel is also art deco.

and happy coincidence: friend and former student zac is in town at the same time, so we'll find time for a drink or two in south beach.

sick sick sick

2007-01-22T09:47:00.000-08:00

for half of last week, I tried to convince myself that I just had laryngitis but actually felt fine. and that worked until this weekend, when I finally succumbed to the plague. now I actually feel as bad as I sound, so posting may be light. need to nurse myself back to health before I head to miami next week to speak at a retailing conference.

and btw, sudacare shower soothers and neither soothing nor vaporizing. in fact, they suck. save your money.

follow the LEEDer

2007-01-17T11:04:00.000-08:00

this is shaping up to be an architecture-filled week. I finally joined the LA conservancy - something I've meant to do for, oh, I don't know - maybe two years. I joined because I decided a good gift for john's birthday would be a walking tour in downtown LA, followed by lunch. we did the art deco tour, which was wonderful. john and I go on so many modern architecture tours, celebrating the simplicity of design (which sometimes crosses over to a slavish devotion to austerity), it was refreshing to tour these over-the-top buildings designed with excess in mind. my only regret - we never made it to the eastern columbia building - I suspect because john kept holding the tour up taking pictures. above, find my crappy ones. they almost pass for buildings in new york, no? until you take a look at that sky - that could only be LA in january.

last night josh and I attended the reception at livinghomes to celebrate their LEED platinum certification. I think josh is going to be posting on the party later on curbed, but let me sum up: kelly kapowski was there and looking very well preserved since her saved by the bell/90210 days - but what she was going at a party for sustainable design is anyone's guess. I mean, where is ed begley jr when you need him?

I have a new crush on eric garcetti, who is one of the most amazing public speakers I've ever witnessed. smart, articulate and passionate. and huge fan of curbed - apparently we're on his RSS feed. any politician who has an RSS feed, who even knows what one is, has my vote. and he agreed to go to dinner with josh and me sometime. most of the attendees got a hearty handshake from eric, we got a high five. seriously. a high five. at the age of 33, I wasn't quite sure how to react to the high five. we also spotted ray kappe, who has apparently no memory of being interviewed by me for curbed, and his wife shelly - who was completely endearing and does remember ray's interview. the speeches were interminable, the house is beautiful (steve glenn gave josh and me a tour about a month ago), and all the leftover food was turned into compost.

tonight, going to a walk-through for the new W development going up in hollywood. something tells me they're going to be lacking a composting machine.

school starts

2007-01-11T18:39:00.000-08:00

I prefer to teach while reclining.

I started teaching today. and started a blog for the class. excited to be back in the classroom, but exhausted from the effort. after a day spent on campus, I get to spend my night working on a radar project. deadlines are so much fun.

habitat 825 update

2007-01-09T14:27:00.000-08:00

its been a long, long time since I've posted photos of the progress at lorcan o'herlihy's habitat 825. the condos are even now available for pre-sale and should be ready for occupancy by april. it seems like just yesterday they were breaking ground, amidst the kerfuffle the MAK center caused. so her's the latest, taken on sat when I was at the schindler house. That scaffolding should be off any day now...

2007 docenting duties

2007-01-04T18:31:00.000-08:00

My first docent weekend of 2007 is approaching. I'll be at the schindler house this sat from 11-2:30, giving tours of the house (free with admission). this time I'll try to remember to bring my camera to snap the progress of Habitat 825 next door since its been months since I've posted on it, and it looks like its almost done. Occupancy is supposed to begin April 1. wow, that was fast.

anyway, I believe I'm nearing the two year mark at the schindler house sometime in 2007, and its still pretty fun. my favorite groups are usually the college students (I love the kids. Kids! Get on my lawn!), but who doesn't love the occasional german tourist, with their fanny packs and black socks? the other thing I love - I'm still discovering new details in the house. A joint I never noticed, or doors that swing in both directions, or the fact that the indoor fireplaces still work. who knew? not I.

the only downside - the schindler house's new kitten rudy (guess who he's named after) is now housed somewhere in the palisades. Rudy liked to follow the docents from room to room, like the ghost of Schindler, silently judging our performance. I miss that cat.

new year's resolutions

2007-01-02T18:47:00.000-08:00

I got back to LA a few days ago after ten days in nyc. ten very hectic, but not very cold days. and as always, coming back to LA is always a relief. after over three years here, I still don't take the weather for granted. I'm still amazed by clear skies, sunlight and warmth. I still feel giddy when I see roses and jasmine in bloom in january.

this trip was mostly about seeing friends and family, so there was very little in the way of "culture" - high or low. I did manage to make it to cooper hewitt with my sister and johanna to see the design triennial. at this point, the cooper hewitt has become a xmas tradition for my sister and me. my favorite piece in the show was by joshua davis - and I'm sorely tempted to order a print of his from his gallery in barcelona (pictured above). ironically, his studio is just a mile or two from my parent's house.

so this is the time of year everyone makes their new years resolutions and I've been determined to only make resolutions I can actually keep, since my resolve is weak. so so weak.

thus, my new years resolutions are all media-related, as in, I am determined to consume MORE media:

watch battlestar galactica from the beginning. I've watched the miniseries/pilot - now I'm determined to catch up via netflix.
ditto for the wire.
read the power broker. this is the one that might actually take most of 2007.

I feel like I had a few others, but I forget already. ok, maybe I'll throw one non-media related one in there. I really should take calcium.

back in ny

2006-12-21T08:12:00.000-08:00

my first day in new york was spent with my father, who's recovery from his surgery has been nothing less than remarkable. he's still not 100% but I can't believe how far he's come since I was here last month.

heading towards manhattan soon to meet some friends for lunch - for my beloved xiao long bao - soup dumplings. my friends understand me so well. the "clean" flavors at din tai fung in arcadia just don't do it for me - I like my broth heavy and flavorful. its been months since I've had one of those little dumplings - my excitement is maybe a little out of proportion to my lunch plans.

the rest of the week will again revolve mostly around food. eileen and I were going to try una pizza napoletana, until we realized its not open for lunch. a fellow diner at mozza in LA recommended we try it, so it will have to wait for another day. christmas is of course all about movies and chinese food. and while I would love to experience l'atelier de Joel Robuchon, I'm afraid my most likely hotel dining experience this week will likely be at burger joint (which isn't necessarily a bad thing - how did I live 4 blocks from here for 7 years and just discover it now?)

the rest of the week - family, friends and museums. my sister and I now have a tradition of spending an afternoon at the cooper hewitt - which is currently exhibiting its design triennial. and I feel compelled to go to MOMA because they have a koolhaas exhibit, and he was the subject of my thesis. plus there are picasso exhibits everywhere in ny this season, but I think I want to visit the whitney's because they also have a kiki smith exhibit and one on bauhaus. so many museums, so little time.

off to slurp soup dumplings for now.

yup, I think I still have ADD

2006-12-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

I received two of the books I ordered from Amazon on thurs. I have about 10 more pages to go in Rakoff's Don't Get Too Comfortable: The Indignities of Coach Class, The Torments of Low Thread Count, The Never- Ending Quest for Artisanal Olive Oil, and Other First World Problems. I do love all of the This American Life contributors books, but I've come to realize they're more or less just Bobo mind candy. Funny and wry and smartly satirical but ultimately slightly vacuous. Tasty and easy to digest and they generally preach to the liberal, elite, politically progressive, gay-loving, god-hating heathens of the two coasts. Basically, me. I don't mean to disparage Rakoff and his ilk, but I'm starting to feel a little worn out. Although I still have a deep and abiding love of Sarah Vowell, who I truly feel is a level or two above her compatriots, Rakoff and Sedaris, perhaps because she's such a self-deprecating civics nerd and maybe because she managed to humanize history in Assassination Vacation. In any case, I tore through Don't Get Too Comfortable in 2 or 3 days in what was a fairly busy weekend. I dont think that's a reflection of my prodigious reading talents. I think the book is just a little, um, fluffy. (but what was I expecting with a subtitle that references low thread count sheets?).

The true test of my literary ADD is next. I'm going to start vidal's Lincoln - and we'll see if I can get through fiction again (dipping my toes with historical fiction). I also leave for new york tomorrow, so with a 6 hour flight and occasional train trips between long island and manhattan, this is the perfect testing ground. I usually buy every single shelter and food mag I don't subscribe to for my flight (punctuated by an US Weekly and Vogue here and there). will try to curtail my mag consumption in favor of something a little more...weighty but it will be difficult. wish me luck.

its alive: livinghomes

2006-12-17T19:49:00.000-08:00

yesterday josh and I got a tour of the first livinghome built in santa monica, and currently occupied by the developer steve glenn. will try to write more on it tomorrow, or just let josh write it up for curbed, but price aside (which is very, very high for a prefab home but zero emissions, zero energy, zero water COSTS $$$, people!), the house was impressive - the design (by ray kappe), the LEED platinum certification, the craftsmenship. so instead of writing it up, a couple of photos:

the solar photovoltaic panels on the roof.

the second floor.

the living room

all the appliances are built into the wall - including the coffeemaker. if I drank coffee, I would love this.

the kitchen

the fireplace. its the centerpiece of the house and anchors the living areas.

fire up the tivo

2006-12-13T15:27:00.000-08:00

did a quick interview this am with cnbc on the yahoo/abc dealio announced today. should be on around 4:40 PST today - I think they got one or two good quotes pulled from it. if I find the online video after it airs, will post a link to it. thanks to cnbc* for putting my mug over the airwaves.

*but jim cramer is still a tool.

A reader divided against herself cannot stand

2006-12-07T18:20:00.000-08:00

for months now, Middlesex has sat on my nightstand taunting me. Everyone tells me I will love it. I've read a couple of chapters, but its just not grabbing me. I had the same problem with the plot against america. I never used to have a problem getting into books - when I was in college I use to challenge myself to read a book a week on my summer vacations, since I never felt like I had enough time during the school year to read for fun. and I've read both eugenides and roth before and have loved them both. so I don't think its the author or the quality. I think its me. for some reason, I'm struggling with fiction these days. the last few books I tore through were all non-fiction: the tender bar, slouching towards bethlehem, the sarah vowell books. these days I only have the patience for essays and memoirs apparently.

so I'm giving up and giving in - at least for now. I put middlesex back on the bookcase for another day and just ordered two vidal books: lincoln: a novel (but its a work of historical fiction - does that count? sarah vowell whetted my lincoln appetite and I feel the compelled to find a political figure I can actually admire), and palimpsest: a memoir. see? - back to the memoirs. and I can't get away from NPR contributors either. for a little levity and a lot of snark I also ordered Don't Get Too Comfortable: The Indignities of Coach Class, The Torments of Low Thread Count, The Never- Ending Quest for Artisanal Olive Oil, and Other First World Problems by daniel rakoff. he had me at artisanal olive oil. with a long trip to ny in a couple of weeks I should be able to get through at least one or two of them pretty quickly.

more gore, por favor

2006-12-06T19:09:00.000-08:00

so john and I made it to the skirball last night, after a lovely drive along mulholland to avoid rush hour traffic, and were first on the wait list. of course we got into the lecture. and it was worth it - vidal didn't disappoint. he's using a wheelchair these days but he's just as sharp as he ever was. and funny. and patrician. the conversation ran the gamut from contemporary writers to abraham lincoln to jackie kennedy to newt gingrich to media consolidation to american imperialism. and his career(s) as a novelist, pundit, screenwriter, playwright, would-be politician, and actor. and he does a couple of mean impressions: bush, john kennedy and aaron burr (although we'll have to take his word on that one).

I didn't take notes but I'll try to quote (possibly misquote) some of his one-liners:

"today we have many more good writers than good readers."
"it takes a certain kind of genius to make history boring to children."
"jackie had a thirst for revenge towards anyone she thought had wronged her family."
in response to the question "is it enough if bush is just hamstrung for the next two years by congress?": "isn't it enough? we all just want him to go back to texas."
after relating the story of aaron burr's duel with alexander hamilton and burr's belief that the world wasn't big enough for both burr and hamilton, upon reflecting towards the end of his life: "Aaron Burr said 'If I had read more voltaire, and less rousseau, I would have realized the world was big enough for both aaron burr and alexander hamilton.'"

how's that for meta? I'm quoting vidal quoting burr. I wish I could remember more.

in any case, I was grateful to get the opportunity to see him speak when I had the opportunity. I keep trying to think of someone who can be considered the next gore vidal, a prolific writer and thinker, a man or woman with a huge set of cojones willing to say what they truly believe, on camera and off, regardless of how (un)popular that opinion might be. someone willing to call people, the media, and goverments on their bullshit. someone who can be considered a true polymath. I'm coming up short.

am I getting really old, that I'm beginning to wax nostalgic for the gore vidals, bella abzugs, and norman mailers of yore? perhaps I am. and I was right about one thing before we went: john and I averaged a good 30 years younger than the overwhelming majority of the crowd. which is a terrible shame, because the kids today - they need to hear what he has to say.

and as jessica said recently, youtube is truly god's work. I present to you the infamous vidal/buckely debate in 1968, wherein vidal calls buckley a nazi, and buckley calls vidal a queer. brilliant.

gore no more?

2006-12-05T12:34:00.000-08:00

so it looks like gore vidal is sold out at the skirball. john and I are still going to try to go and see if there are standing room tickets available, because gore's, like, old and shit and there probably won't be too many other opportunities to see him speak. is it crazy to battle rush hour traffic to drive all the way across town to most probably get the tara-reid-treatment-at-hyde just on the off chance we can see the old kook speak one last time before he kicks it? I guess so. but what else are we going to do with our time?

totally unrelated but my parents have bought me the greatest chanukah gift ever - its especially indulgent this year because they feel grateful for some of the post-surgery help. I should mention that in my family, chanukah is a minor, minor holiday. we buy gifts for the kids and the adults take a name out of the hat. one gift for one person. its a relief, quite frankly. so I didn't expect anything more than a $50 gift certificate to sephora. instead, they splurged and I am so grateful: the le creuset dutch oven I've been lusting for in my favorite color - flame. now I am obligated to cook more for friends. soon I will be braising like a pro.

one angry old man

2006-12-04T16:52:00.000-08:00

john and I are heading west to the skirball ~~tonight~~ tomorrow to see the esteemed man of letters, gore vidal. with his controversial views on George Bush, 9/11, the Iraq war, William F. Buckley and even world war II, it should be a fun couple of hours. (please call someone a "pro- crypto Nazi" - if the evening doesn't end in potential litigation, I will have to ask for my money back). with our current administration, its like shooting fish in a barrel. and I have a feeling this will do nothing for my current problem of spending all of my time with retirees. does gore vidal have a big tatted-up, nose-ringed, hardcore youth audience? I hope so.

Why I love the beginning of the month

2006-12-04T08:52:00.000-08:00

because there's a new eyesore of the month awaiting me, with james howard kunstler's inimitable brand of vitriol and sarcasm. even if I dont always agree with his kneejerk reactions to contemporary architecture, its always enjoyable reading. case in point: the last two months he's gone after memorialist-extraordinaire Daniel Libeskind (or as he refers to him "architect/savant"). Pictured above is his new addition to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, or as Kunstler call it - "the 'Elephant Man' of museums, " comparing it to a tumor. is major problem with it:

Now, you may ask yourself: why is this sort of thing acceptable to the Guardians of Culture? The answer may be that it sends a truthful but subliminal message (which, alas, we are misinterpreting) that the mis-use of technology has become the fatal disease of civilization.

Have truer words ever been blogged?

making connections

2006-11-26T15:48:00.000-08:00

while this weekend has mostly been full of good food and friends, I've also had a few deadlines looming this week which means I've had to sit in front of the laptop more hours than I would like. it also starts to make me feel loopy after a while and my mind begins to wander. case in point: yesterday's visit to lacma to see the magritte exhibit. I dragged chris to the museum, and he was clearly dismayed by the lines, the prices, the crowds, and the screaming children, so I have to give him credit for his patience and perseverance. (note to parents: sure, we applaud your attempt to expose the kids to "high culture" but leave the screaming babies at home. same goes for the kids who lay sprawled out on the floor of the exhibition).

I've been mulling over how I feel about the exhibit. I've never been a huge fan of magritte, but then again, I was never as familiar with him as I was with surrealists like dali, de chirico, miro and man ray. I think I gave him short shrift - he was far more clever, more highly conceptual, less interested in freud than many of his contemporaries (all pluses in my book).

I loved the exhibition design by baldessari. let's just get that out of the way. its site-specific, smart, and absurd in a way I think magritte would have loved. I loved the idea of relating magritte to the conceptual artists of the 60s and 70s (and 80s and 90s too, for that matter). the concept resonates for me - drawing direct lines between magritte and bochner, ruscha and baldessari. I think where the exhibit failed for me is in execution. not all the time - sometimes it worked exceeding well. especially in the case of ruscha (especially Actual Size and Lion in Oil) and magritte - not exactly an obvious pairing. (on a side note, I developed a crush on ed ruscha's work at his lacma show last summer. I' m happy to report it 's blossoming into a full-blown love affair.)

Actual Size, Ed Ruscha, 1962

but in too many cases, it felt like the curators were far too literal in their attempt to connect more modern artists to Magritte. case in point: Koon's Train and Magritte's Time Transfixed.

Rene Magritte, Time Transfixed, 1938

Jeff Koons, Jim Beam J.B. Turner Train, 1986

Ok, so they both feature trains. other than that, its sort of difficult to discern the connection between the two pieces. Particularly since Koons modeled his train not as an homage to magritte but to scotch. the connection is tenuous at best. the inclusion of Koon's Bunny is a little easier to stomach. after all, the subtitle to the exhibit is "the treachery of images" and Bunny captures that - it looks weightless but its made from stainless steel. Even Koon's outsized sculptures like Balloon Dog or Moon would make more sense here - and connect to magritte's tendency to play with size and scale in his work to evoke the "uncanny" (yes, it must always come back to freud one way or another).

despite my misgivings, its a fun exhibit (is it ok to describe Art-with-a-capital-A as fun?). its also not traveling - making it just that much more special. it belongs to LA.

I had also wanted to write in this post about Pandora, since that service is also about uncovering non-obvious connections and I've been using it all weekend instead of my ipod. but now I'm too tired from thinking about magritte. maybe I'll write about that in another post, although aram will probably bitch if I write about it here, rather than on the company blog. so I'll save it for another day.

weekend on the eastside, sorta

2006-11-20T15:28:00.000-08:00

it feels like a long time since I had an architecture-related weekend, but this weekend was fairly full. I did my docent duties saturday morning at the schindler house, including a class of about 30 student from pcc. I love student tours. I find high schoolers are generally a little less enthusiastic, but the college students almost always dig the tour. plus, I'm a pretentious blowhard who loves to hear herself talk, so I enjoy the student tours. it feels like I'm teaching again. and speaking of, it looks like I'm going to be back on USC's campus come spring to teach an undergrad course there on virtual communities.

but getting back to the weekend, josh and I spent some quality Curbed time together. on thurs we hit the Coalition for Clean Air eco-fashion benefit (I decided against wearing a leather shirt AND leather boots. went with just the boots. is that still too un-pc? they're louboutin but I found them at a consignment shop. doesn't that count as smart recycling?). anyway, you have not lived until you've seen councilpersons ed reyes and janice hahn modeling environmentally-friendly fashion. H-O-T-T. the playstation3 launch party was almost anti-climactic after that. Almost. While I got to see janice hahn save snakes, cows and furry animals from becoming Anna Wintour's latest accessory, I also got to see Dave Navarro murder Iggy Pop. Or at least his music. but again, I digress from the architecture stuff.

so yesterday josh, john and jack and I (yup, token female. token hetero. token name-that-does-not-begin-with-J) headed east to the Arroyo Arts Collective discovery tour - a self-guided tour of artists' homes and studios, mostly in highland park. most of the homes were turn of the century craftsman. since I haven't been on craftsman tours, I didn't pay much attention to the artists' work, and instead enjoyed the homes. a few even managed to feel very light and airy, despite all the dark wood, entire walls of glass-enclosed wood built ins, and relatively low ceilings. The tour ended with a reception at the Lummis House, which I'm ashamed to say, I had never even heard of until yesterday. I really must get farther east than the 5 more often.

oh, and casino royale was pretty good. I have a crush on daniel craig and his mankini now.

what to wear?

2006-11-16T17:57:00.000-08:00

tonight is a perplexing one due to double booking. I usually dont have a problem deciding what to wear in LA, since jeans are pretty much acceptable everywhere, as long as they're sold in barneys.

but tonight is a tough one: a coalition for clean air benefit AND a playstation launch party. hmm. the reason josh and I agreed to the clean air benefit isn't really bc we believe in clean air (who doesn't?). its because we relish the opportunity to possibly see jeffrey sebelia AND jan perry at the same party. please, please let that happen. project runway and politics - perfect together.

and then playstation. what says I love the environment AND I heart video games? josh is threatening to wear fur (what? its biodegradable!) and I threatened to wear entirely synthetic fabrics that are highly flammable, wrapped in leather. because we love eco-fashion.

I spend all my time with old people

2006-11-14T09:34:00.000-08:00

back in LA after a week in nyc. my father is recovering well from his surgery, albeit slowly. the week was hectic and I didn't get to do very much other than speak at a conference, and help care for my father. while I was there, I did have one afternoon free between the conference and taking my sister to dinner for her birthday (which was really excellent). so I managed to visit the morgan library since renzo piano's expansion. piano is one of my favorite architects - sure, he seems to be the go-to guy for any and all museum projects these days (LACMA, nasher, whitney), but his work is always elegant, classically beautiful, refined. he's the little black dress of architects. and his ability to marry diverse forms and buildings at the morgan library, gives me hope for the LACMA project.

but back to the title of this post. I've realized that because I have a somewhat flexible schedule, I wind up with a schedule similar to retirees. when I went to early voting, I was the youngest in the room by 30 years. same at the morgan library in the middle of a wednesday afternoon. ditto for trader joe's at 11am. pretty soon you'll see me at bingo night at the local rotary club. or making reservations for the early bird special at a sizzlin' steakhouse. or driving around 20 mph with my left blinker on for miles.

just a reminder of all the things I need to accomplish before I shuffle off this mortal coil.

I voted

2006-11-02T18:10:00.000-08:00

so I stopped into beverly hills town hall to vote early today since I'll be out of town next week during election day. early voting is a godsend - we never had it in ny. its just me and a half dozen retirees voting. the difference between the blue hairs and I (me?, myself? I'm stumped by the grammar) is, I had downloaded to my blackberry the california democratic party recommendations for the propositions, since I needed a cheat sheet. I had already made up my mind on 87 and 90, but the rest had me a little mystified, so I needed some guidance.

I leave for ny on sat, to help out with my father's recovery and to speak at a conference. sadly, I dont think that leaves much time to catch up with friends, shop, or hit my favorite museums in ny. I'll have to save that for the christmas-time trip I'll probably make. I do have one night carved out to take my sister to dinner for her 25th birthday. the rest is up in the air.

so its unlikely I'll have any interesting architecture-related blogging going on while in ny. while I'm gone, make sure you vote. apathy is so 2002 midterm election.

gen(h)ome + mak day

2006-10-25T11:22:00.000-07:00

there is a small possibility I'll be out of town on sunday. but if not, I'm going to try to stop by the mak center for mak day. every year on schindler's birthday, the museum is free and this year there's a really interesting exhibit opening that day: gen(h)ome. I'm not always a huge fan of the mak center's exhibitions, but I think this one may be kind of great. I saw some of the installation last weekend when I was docenting. its a cool concept: to explore the "genetic modifications" artists can achieve in the building and the landscape, and to try to link technological innovation in the natural sciences (like genetics) and architecture. there are events all day, but the opening reception is in the evening, from 6-8pm. best of all, coolest exhibition title EVER. no, seriously. that's awesome.

your body is a battleground

2006-10-17T13:26:00.000-07:00

I know going to a lecture on a sat evening isn't everyone's idea of fun, but I'm sort of intrigued by this one: Barbara Kruger at the hammer. I've been a fan of hers ever since I wrote my honors thesis as an undergrad on images of women in advertising (what can I say? it was the early to mid 90s, I was an art history major, and pomo was H-O-T). but I digress - she's still sort of subversive, although I fear the joke might be lost on kids today reared in an age of irony and identity politics. since I postponed my nyc trip til nov, I'm not yet sure what I have going on this weekend. if I find myself on the westside, this is high on the to-do list.

I skipped san clemente last weekend (no nuclear boobs! damn!) but did manage to take in the gen art runway show (a lot of the stuff looked deconstructed but not in a Rei Kawakubo way. more of a lazy/lacking in talent way). but the evening was saved by some of the best people watching I've seen in a long time. or at least since Mark took me a secret speakeasy under an art gallery downtown the night before. I have a feeling the hammer might be a little more tame, but a little more substantive.

quiet lately

2006-10-10T18:09:00.000-07:00

I know I've been ignoring this blog lately (although I've still been posting on curbed la). my father was scheduled to have two spinal surgeries today and I have tickets to go back to ny next week. my mother had asked me to come to ny after the surgery so that I could play pinch hitter when she goes back to work, and help with some of the recovery stuff.

it turns out that dr's get sick too. my father's surgeon has a case of the sniffles, or Bird Flu. I dont know. he has something. and its serious enough to postpone the surgery. I try to avoid talking about personal stuff on this blog (although I break that rule more and more) but between work and family, I just haven't had much to say on this blog. so things might be quiet for the next few weeks as I rearrange my plane ticket and schedule to accomodate new plans.

but just so I provide a few links related to architecture 'n stuff:

I want to go here in nov: Skin + Bones : Parallel Practices in Fashion and Architecture at MOCA.
I think I said this before - jon stewart is my husband, colbert is my dirty, dirty mistress.
I'm going back to san clemente this weekend, home of the twin nuclear tits, but if I was going to be in LA, I might go see steve martin and harry shearer speak.

divided loyalties

2006-10-03T17:21:00.000-07:00

a friend from the old hood pointed out to me yesterday that the mets are playing the dodgers in the playoffs starting tomorrow. I know I should remain loyal to my hometown team. I grew up a few miles away from shea. I went to mets games as a kid. I stayed up late to watch them win in 86. but that was a long time ago. my teens/20s were spent at yankee stadium. I was never a major baseball fan - but I dated a few back in ny. (I used to have a boyfriend who claimed he could tell whether someone was a mets or yankees fan just by looking at them - and he was usually right. it took me a while to figure out how he was secretly divining their loyalty - if they were irish, italian, jewish, or from queens, SI, LI, or jersey: mets. if they were black, latino, asian or from manhattan, bronx or brooklyn: yankees. so simple. classify by ethnicity - why didn't I think of that?)

anyway, while I think dodger dogs are an affront to sausages everywhere, and we all know how much I like to sit in dodger stadium and ponder the massive betrayal of the public trust that built it, I sort of love dodger stadium. I love the view on a clear day. I love the way you come in towards the top and descend down to your seats. I love seeing families of all ages (hollywood seems to be kid-poor). so despite the consternation I will face from friends back home, I may have to root for the dodgers. unless of course, foxsports is right (is fox ever right about anything?) and this boils down to a yankees vs. dodgers world series. A-rod will come out of that summer slump. I know it.

Los Angeles, I'm Yours

2006-09-30T09:08:00.000-07:00

back in the city of angels. every time I go back to ny, I love it and miss it and after a week, I'm ready to leave it. this trip was a little more over-scheduled than most, so my time was mostly spent working, and seeing family for rosh hashana. plus the wedding. and a little shopping. and conferences are mostly about constantly feeling tired, cold and hungry - at least for me. so this trip didn't include much in the way of memorable meals/museum visits. a shame, I know. I did manage to swing by the moma for the herzog and de meuron exhibition - two days after it closed. I wandered around the permanent collection a bit, and tried to read a little in the garden, but found myself feeling too anxious and restless to enjoy the museum (with the exception of the wonderful rachel whiteread, which the new building is better equipped to exhibit, or maybe they're just acquiring more of her pieces. I just don't remember the moma owning much whiteread until recently). I think her work speaks to the architecture junkie in me. so the outrageous entry fee to the moma almost feels worth it to walk through Untitled (Paperbacks). (similar in concept and execution to her holocaust monument in judenplatz, vienna).

Rachel Whiteread. (British, born 1963). Untitled (Paperbacks). 1997.
Plaster and steel, Overall 14' 9 1/8" x 15' 9" x 20' 8 3/4" (450 x 480 x 632 cm).

I also had a wonderful view of foster's new hearst building from the rainbow room, and watched it recede into total darkness as night fell while I was at the wedding.
as I made my way around the city, I finally finished reading slouching towards bethlehem, joan didion's essays about california. some of them eerily resonant for a book written in the 1960s (los angeles' most enduring images is the city on fire), some quaintly nostalgic (naive meth addicts in the haight). I felt an odd cognitive dissonance reading it while in new york. and now I've begun the memoir (again based on jessica's recommendation. she's become my book guru), The Tender Bar, and am feeling the reverse dissonance. JR Moehringer's memoir takes place in Manhasset, one town over from my parent's new house. just a few miles from where I grew up. I even started reading the book while on the LIRR heading back to my parent's place, as I cringed listening to the accents around me (an accent I'm occasionally accused of having, and have consciously worked to lose, but sometimes beer gets the best of us and it slips out unintended).

I'm only about 100 pages into it, but as I read it, I keep thinking "I know these guys. I grew up with these guys." Sorta. The guys in this book were like the ones I went to grade school and junior high with - the irish and italian, lower middle class guys who were less academically inclined than my friends and I, mostly the kids of immigrants, or immigrants ourselves. they were the ones who had been in ny for many more generations, who didnt subscribe to the american dream the way we still clung to it (or our parents drilled it into us). they were the ones who grew up to be cops, mechanics, bartenders. the ones we had crushes on in junior high and had just became aware of boys - because they already looked like men. the ones we left behind by high school - they all went to their zoned high schools, while my friends and I all filtered into ny's magnet schools (none of our families could afford private school, so we had to depend on our academic talents to save us from the hell that is the new york public high school system).

so I feel a certain kinship to the world he's describing, even if I've never truly been a part of it. our constant striving, our immigrant moms, our self-conscious attempts not to pronounce "water" like it has an "aw" in the middle, separated us.

hm, not sure where I'm going with this but since its a blog and not a book report, let me just say, two thumbs up on the Tender Bar. so far.

and so glad to be back in LA. heading over to the CA boom show later today, volunteering at the MAK tour tomorrow, so a big architecture weekend for me. will try to take and post pics.

I want an indian wedding

2006-09-24T21:03:00.000-07:00

if I ever get married, I think I might have to have an indian wedding. any celebration that involves cutting off traffic on 49th street in the middle of the afternoon so the groom could ride a horse (both of them dressed in traditional indian garb - apparently elephants are too hard to rent in ny), live drummers, and men dancing wildly in the streets, is the kind of party I want to be involved in.

other things I discovered this weekend:

the rainbow room is a classic for a reason. gorgeous art deco interiors, amazing views.
prayer in any language bores me. hebrew, urdu, whatever. yawn.
I think I discovered the fatal flaw in norman foster's new hearst building: it seems to disappear at night. completely. it wasnt visible from the rainbow room as soon as the sun went down - I dont know if that's a temporary thing or if its better lit during the week when employees are there late. its such a gorgeous building, just wish the exterior lighting was better.
I might need a break from jewish food for a while. I think I doubled my cholesterol in the past 48 hours. oh wait, next week we get to fast for yom kippur. I'm almost looking forward to it.
my parents have 3 tivos yet only seem to record shows that end in "ood." that means a season or two of deadwood and the brotherhood. they're addicted to premium cable.

I'm stressed

2006-09-20T15:22:00.000-07:00

work has been very, very busy lately - which is typically a good thing when you're just starting out. but a combination of factors is stressing me out and I haven't had time to blog. so to recap lately: mammoth is great. Go, even in the summer. great hiking, great canoeing. it looked like there was great fishing and it's all pretty cheap in the off season. plus I got to see california's fault line, which gets deep enough in spots you can't see the bottom. awesomely scary.

heading to nyc tomorrow for a wedding, a conference, and some round challah with the family. now that I've been gone awhile, I feel like friends are starting to treat me like a tourist. one ex-boss is taking me to his favorite off-broadway play (have I mentioned my intense dislike of musicals?) - sweet, but I foresee 2 hours of hell) and another is taking me to the isaac mizrahi show (ok, I kind of like his talk show). but I feel like I'm one Les Miz ticket away from a fanny pack and subway map.

despite all the "entertainment" planned, I haven't made a single dinner reservation anywhere, I have no idea what to pack in terms of footwear, and I havent really made definitive sleeping arrangements anywhere, since I figure there are a ton of friends/family I can crash at. the good news: the weather is around 70 everyday and it doesn't look like it will rain much (although I sort of hope for at least a drizzle). still on the agenda - the herzog and de meuron show at moma, planning to skip zaha at the guggenheim after hearing too many lukewarm reviews, and unfortunately I've already seen the utensil show at the cooper hewitt. with the way my calendar is shaping up, I dont think I"ll have a lot of time to wander the museums. work, work, work.

goin fishin'

2006-09-15T08:56:00.000-07:00

one of my goals this year, after now living in LA for 3 years, has been to get out of LA more. see more of california. C and I went to san luis obispo in march, I went on a couple of trips to laguna and other parts of orange county, and now this weekend, off to mammoth - which I've never been to. and now I remember why - I don't have the proper wardrobe for cold weather. its dipping down to the 20s and 30s in mammoth this weekend. holy shite, that cold. its been a pretty stressful week, so I'm looking forward to hiking, the lake, canoeing and yes, maybe even fishing. plus we've got a dog, a fireplace, and vodka olga brought back from the ukraine. what else does one need for a cozy weekend in the mountains? that ukrainian moonshine will make me forget all about the fact I don't have a winter jacket.

and then off to nyc next thurs. can't wait to be back in MY natural habitat - concrete, skyscrapers, and shopping.

Aram calls Matt Lauer "glib"

2006-09-13T10:55:00.000-07:00

Aram's appearance on the Today show yesterday. Now online.

ca boom tour

2006-09-10T13:38:00.000-07:00

yesterday, john and I went to the ca boom silver lake architecture tour. will write up more on that when I have more time , and will post on it for curbed once john uploads his much more professional photos than mine. but in the meantime, I was able to upload half my photos - flickr is driving me crazy, randomly decided that half my photos are not jpgs and half of them are. anyway, here are the photos of neutra's VDL and ohara residence (my favorite on the tour, restored by bonura building), the elevado residence by gubel & associates, the altman residence by finarchitecture (my least favorite), the creative-named silver lake house by standard llp (gorgeous), and the campbell-machado residence (more on that one later but there is a reason I have almost no photos of that one. the houseboys/sentinels standing guard on every floors were a bit intimidating).

our little company on ABC world news tonight

2006-09-07T15:55:00.000-07:00

aram has been on a tear lately - tons of print, but now he's getting some TV spots/online. behold- aram on world news tonight. and there is talk on the today show this morning but we haven't found it online yet.

best perk yet

2006-09-07T01:14:00.000-07:00

every once in a while, being one of the co-editors of curbed LA has its perks - if you're an architecture geek. sure, it may lack the free products and gadgets "real" journalists get at "reputable" magazines, but I get access to tours. and this sat I'm going to CA Boom's silver lake architecture tour with a friend. I only hope this means we have passes to the other three tours this fall.

they'll be coming for me any minute

2006-09-05T20:32:00.000-07:00

I just realized that in the course of posting today and updating some of the sidebars on this blog, I recently googled the search terms "san+onofre+nuclear+power+plant" and "plot+against+america." I'm going to go search for "jon+benet+pornography" now and then just wait for the jackbooted thugs to come kicking in my door.

p.s. happy birthday, jess.

The OC: No McMansions, No Traffic

2006-09-05T19:39:00.000-07:00

I spent the weekend in san celemente, site of a heated battle over home heights and richard nixon retirement village. I mentioned last week I was hoping we were heading to a mcmansion, since that's all they build in orange county, right? (un)fortunately san clemente's buildings are relatively modest two-story homes, whose size is deceptive from the outside. we were right above a golf course overlooking the ocean, so at least that part fulfilled the fantasy. but dave's home has some great 60s/70s bones, with the requisite sunken living room, stone-covered wall and two decks.

I wasn't able to observe any cougars in their natural habitat, the way we did earlier in the summer in laguna. or sleep in a mcmansion. or even hit horrendous traffic on the 405. instead, we grilled. we drank. we watched the third season of arrested development on dvd. and the first season of miami vice (still totally fucking stylish and much darker than I remember - and did they invent the concept of music licensing or just pay a fortune for tina turner and phil collins?).

instead of mcmansions, there were mobile homes and trailers lining san onofre, where we played bocce by the beach every day. I know I've been living in LA for three years but I still find the surfing subculture this strange, exotic animal. and san clemente, rather than letting you observe cougars in all their disquieting glory, provides ample opportunity to observe surfers in their element, oblivious to the twin breasts of the san onofre power plant adjacent to the beach.

gorgeous, aren't they?

hard to come back to LA, to the heat and the work that is waiting. I feel ready for fall. for cooler weather. for boots. for jackets. for hot soup. for the new fall season. who did meredith choose? what will happen to jack and kate and sawyer and hurley now that they're with the Others? will michael knight win project runway or will we have to suffer through yet another miscarriage of justice? will tim gunn adopt me and become my life coach?

god I love fall.

Three years

2006-09-01T07:45:00.000-07:00

I realized a couple of days ago, I just passed the three year mark in LA - the three fastest years of my life. and I realized I'm slowly starting to think like an angeleno:

this week my car has been a fickle, unhappy mistress. but one new battery, one oil check and a smog test later, I think we've reached a detente. what's startling about all this - I refer to my car as my mistress.
I bundled up the other night to go meet a friend in santa monica...because its so much colder by the water.
waking up at 6am to do business with new york no longer seems unreasonable.
I'm going down to a friend's beach house in orange county for the weekend, and I'm secretly hoping its a mcmansion. seriously. I've never been to one before, its in san clemente, and there's a bit of a battle brewing there. so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a gate-guarded community, some faux-tuscan exteriors, maybe a palladian window or two, and if its less than 2,000 sq ft I'm turning the car around and driving home. I just want to see how the other half lives.

happy labor day.

weirdest architecture event I've ever seen

2006-08-29T17:46:00.000-07:00

I'm willing to bet this is the first and only event that combines architecture and cosmetic dentistry:

Lecture by MAK Center for Art & Architecture Artist in Residence Alfredo Barsuglia

DENTISTRY AND CONTEMPORARY ART
Esthetic Dentistry in Los Angeles

Wednesday, August 30th 2006
12-1 pm
Room B3-020

University of California, Los Angeles - UCLA School of Dentistry
Center for the Health Science
10833 Le Conte Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1668

Lunch will be provided

mail@AlfredoBarsuglia.com
www.AlfredoBarsuglia.com
1139 S. Cochran Avenue,
Los Angeles, California 90019
home: 1(323) 936-1465
mobile: 1(323) 877-8622

what I would have written about in curbed today

2006-08-28T22:51:00.000-07:00

so curbed LA is on summer hiatus (if you can call it that) until after labor day. which gives me the opportunity to post here what I would have posted on curbed - and I guess will in a week or so:

we have a date for the first opening of H&M in SoCal: September 21st in pasadena located at 60 W. Colorado Blvd. Beverly Center and Westfield Santa Anita to follow later this year with no set dates. and they couldn't confirm for us a location or opening for H&H, so not sure where that stands.
a soft landing is wishful thinking: krugman predicts a major housing bust. (paid registration)
jess sent us a link to this awesome T shirt.

carmada convoy on sat

2006-08-24T15:04:00.000-07:00

there is way too much going on this weekend, starting with the LAXART benefit tonight and the office of mobile design's prefab party, both at the same time. and of course sunset junction and zero 7 this weekend at the bowl. so I don't think I'll be able to fit in this event, but it sounds very very cool:

CARMADA
Driving art modules
Organized by MAK Center for Art & Architecture Artist in Residence Sonja Vordermaier.

Please join us for the closing party of the CARMADA performance.

Date: August 26, 2006; 7-10 pm
Place: 1168 E. 5th Street, Los Angeles, CA 90013

15 local and international artists transform cars into small exhibition units and scatter into Los Angeles neighborhoods and traffic.
The Convoy will merge at specific points and end the day at downtown parking lot party for celebration and film screenings.

For further information please visit: www.carmada.org

Participating artists:

Eva Castringius
Erik Frydenborg
Gustavo Godoy
Hugo Hopping
Dawn Kasper
John Knuth
Kelly Lycan & Jinhan Ko ˛ Instant_Coffee
Michael Markowsky
Miguel Nelson
Kiersten Puusemp
Nicole C. Russell
Pascual Sisto
Allyson Spellacy
Bettina Camilla Vestergaard
Sonja Vordermaier

if only the airlines had a buy 2, get one free sale

2006-08-22T19:20:00.000-07:00

I booked the first of my three planned fall trips to new york today. the first will put me in ny for rosh hashana for the first time in years, but I also have a wedding that weekend at the rainbow room, which is far more exciting than apples and honey and brisket with the family. and since the couple is half indian refugee activist/half norwegian architect its going to be a blast. how could it possibly be anything else? lest you think its all pleasure, not business - I'm also speaking that week at a conference in midtown. so I'll get to spend some time with family and friends and historic landmarks, and some time in a soul-crushing mid-priced chain hotel. unfortunately, I will have just missed the Dada exhibition at the MOMA (whatever- the hammer's exhibition probably kicked moma's ass) but will hopefully have a chance to catch the herzog and de meuron exhibition, even if I vaguely remember some lousy reviews.

architecture + food + celebrity scions

2006-08-21T19:27:00.002-07:00

I almost missed this since I didn't have my usual wed diet of food reviews last week as I hosted my baby sister: jonathan gold reviews wilson (thumbs up) and gives us an awesome description of the outdoor patio:

The back patio resembles a cross between a Dwell magazine layout and a prison exercise yard.

Its spot on, but he forgot to mention the public restroom overhead lighting. when we walked past the restaurant a few weeks ago, it was the first thing we noticed - no one looks good in that lighting. so we opted for the front patio, which was just slightly better, as long as you don't mind a side of car exhaust with your potato and fig tortelli. but those tortelli are so good they make us forgive booming car bass, unforgiving overhead lighting, and the possibility of proximity to eric owen moss:

As befits a modernist restaurant, the celebrities on view tend to be architects — this is one place where a sighting of Steven Ehrlich or Eric Owen Moss may be as big a deal as spotting Tony Curtis at Spago.

slouching towards broadway

2006-08-21T09:13:00.000-07:00

as joan didion's great 'the year of magical thinking' is adapted as a monologue for broadway, the guardian takes the opportunity to interview didion and take stock of her body of work. I'm admittedly one of the "new, younger readers she has attracted" with the book, but this article makes me want to head over to book soup to pick up a few others, particularly the essay collections like 'the white album'. but can ruminations on 60's california culture ever compare to the heartbreaking precision she uses in magical thinking to capture her overwhelming grief? when I was reading magical thinking while in new york in dec, so many people struck up conversation with me when they saw what I was reading - her grief seemed to fit right in with the zeitgeist. I'm afraid I will inevitably be disappointed. its a good thing I have a massive pile of sept magazines to get through before I can get back to reading actual books.

almost forgot

2006-08-20T09:21:00.000-07:00

with family in town for nearly two weeks straight, I almost forgot that I have to docent today at the schindler house. john kindly switched weeks with me, so I have my docent duties today from 11-2:30. just as reminder, docent tours of the schindler house are available on the weekends, free with admission.

grand ave workshop

2006-08-18T08:18:00.000-07:00

my sister will still be in town tomorrow, so I won't make this but if you feel like waking up early on a sat, the norman lear center is hosting their second grand ave workshop:
The Grand Avenue Civic Park
Public Meeting & Workshop #2
THIS SATURDAY, AUGUST 19th

10am - 12:30pm
National Center for the Preservation of Democracy

111 North Central Avenue
Between First & Temple
Across the plaza from the Japanese American National Museum
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Public parking is available at the lots at First & Central and at First & Alameda

Watch the Webcast on www.grandintervention.org

Join us in Little Tokyo for the second in a series of community workshops. The program -- organized by the official Grand Avenue Park design team, led by Brenda Levin, Mark Rios and Aaron Paley -- will include a presentation of initial design concepts that synthesize the ideas and principles generated in the first workshop. Participants at the workshop and those attending online will have the opportunity to give feedback to the design team.

Can't make it to the meeting? The Norman Lear Center is hosting a LIVE WEBCAST, complete with an online, real-time discussion board. Within 48 hours of the first workshop, as many people had viewed the Webcast online and posted comments as attended in person.

In an effort to extend its public outreach, the Grand Avenue Committee and Related Companies are endorsing event Webcasting and online civic engagement efforts by the Norman Lear Center. Online viewers can post comments and questions, which will be relayed to event moderators. Video of the event and a transcript will be archived online.

Please join us in person or online for this exciting experiment in civic engagement and design.

Download the August 19 flyer

Watch video or read a transcript of the first Community Workshop

Check out the Civic Park Work Plan

Read the Draft EIR Report

end of summer sounds of the schindler house

2006-08-18T08:16:00.000-07:00

you know summer is almost over - the schindler house is hosting their last in the summer series next weekend:

sound. at the Schindler House
Friday, August 25
A TRIBUTE TO THE SOUNDS OF FORBIDDEN PLANET
Celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Louis and Bebe Barron's otherworldly soundtrack with four composers still under its spell: Thomas Dimuzio, Tom Grimley, Sukho Lee and David Rothbaum.
Doors open at 7:00 p.m.
Performances begin at 7:30 p.m.
Advance admission: $18; $14 for students with valid I.D., FOSH (Friends of the Schindler House) and SASSAS (The Society for the Activation of Social Space through Art and Sound) members; $25 at the door.
Space is limited. Advance ticket purchase recommended.
Purchase tickets online: www.soundNet.org/sound/2006 <http://www.soundNet.org/sound/2006>

Presented in association with
MAK Center for Art and Architecture, L.A.
At The Schindler House
835 North Kings Road
West Hollywood, CA 90069
323.651.1510
www.MAKcenter.org
Please do not contact the MAK Center for ticket purchase.

For further information,
visit www.soundnet.org <http://www.soundNet.org/sound/2006/august.shtml> or phone 323/960.5723

loving lorcan

2006-08-14T18:34:00.000-07:00

my interview with lorcan o'herlihy went live on curbed LA today and I'm probably more proud than I should be since it basically consisted of sending an email. if only he had properly answered the fuck, marry kill question. oh well.

I now have my sister in town for a week so posting will be light once again. we scored tickets to the getty villa for today, drove out there intending to have lunch on the patio and got turned away at the door because of a power outage. they intend to honor the tickets another day but that still sucks and wasted too much gas. esp since I need to take her to one of her medical board exams tomorrow in el segundo. and even though I've lived here 3 years, I only have a vague idea of where that is and it sounds far and it will be a bitch doing that drive back and forth twice in one day (since its an 8 hour clinical exam). ah, family.

architecture odds and ends

2006-08-11T15:36:00.000-07:00

dropped my parents off at the airport this morning. they seem to have a knack for traveling during international terror crisis. last summer, they arrived in london the morning of the bombings which luckily kept my sister at home waiting for them rather than on the tube during rush hour. they came to visit me there in 2003 right around the time we declared war and were supposed to have been greeted on the tarmac at heathrow by tanks (at least, they saw it on cnn but seemed to have missed it at the terminal). and this morning they spent an extra half hour repacking all of their liquids. so be forewarned: I will let you know the next time they plan a trip and you can plan accordingly. they're like the angels of terror. other than that, it was a good trip and I might post a little bit about it later since I took them to the schindler house, disney hall, huntington gardens, the venice canals and many many more places.

as for the odds and ends: the mak center architecture tour has confirmed another house - this time a lautner:

Harpel House (John Lautner, 1956)
The Harpel House sits on a Hollywood hillside and is constructed as a triangulated system of deep glulam (glued laminated timber) beams on thick concrete columns. Lautner created a giant trellis covering almost the entire property, part of which was closed off for living and entertainment.

this might be the key to competing with the silver lake tour - even if silvertop's reputation overshadows many of lautner's other works.

and the lorcan o'herlihy interview is going up on curbed LA on monday. finally. and its awesome. email us suggestions for other good interview subjects - we're hoping to make it a semi-regular feature.

MAK center's fall architecture tour needs volunteers

2006-08-04T09:08:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure of the wisdom of planning this so close to the Silver Lake tour, esp since the silverlakers have Silvertop and the houses on the MAK tour are a little less well-known, but who am I to argue? At least the MAK Center has case study #22. hard to beat that. anyway, they're looking for volunteers. still not sure if I'll be in town that week but regardless, its a good way to spend an afternoon AND you're helping a very good cause.

Have you ever dreamed of seeing the interior of some of Los Angeles’ architectural masterworks? Volunteer as a MAK Center Tour docent, and you will get an inside look at some of LA's most impressive modern houses. Dedicate 4 hours as a house docent on October 1, and earn a free ticket to that day’s architecture tour.

MAK Architecture Tour
Sunday, October 1, 2006
10:00 am - 5:00 pm

The 2006 Tour includes:

Case Study House #22 (Pierre Koenig, 1959)
This spectacular hillside house, immortalized in photographs by Julius Shulman is one of the most famous of the Case Study Houses. In perfect original condition, the house features steel construction, an L-shaped plan organized around a swimming pool and a breath-taking view of Los Angeles.

Morgan House (Irving Gill, 1917)
Irving Gill was an important forerunner of southern California modernism who favored the use of site-cast and tilt-slab concrete construction. This concrete house is recently renovated and a lovely example of Gill’s influential stripped-down sensibilities.

Fitzpatrick House (R. M Schindler, 1936)
Commissioned by a real estate developer to attract buyers to the area, this modern beauty sits prominently atop the hill at Laurel Canyon and Mulholland Drive. Spacious yet compactly organized, it is the closest Schindler came to adopting aspects of the International Style.

Kallis House and Studio (R.M Schindler, 1946)
Nestled into the hillside, this house conforms to the topography of the site, creating wonderful rooms with tree-house like qualities. The house is in excellent condition with most of the original features intact.

Other houses still to be confirmed!

Ticket prices for Tour
Self-driven: $65 Friends of the Schindler House and students, $80 general
public. Ride a shuttle bus for the afternoon sites for an additional $40. Lunch will be available for an additional $15

To volunteer as a tour docent, please contact Angelica Fuentes, 323-651-1510 or afuentes@makcenter.org

truth or dare

2006-08-02T16:28:00.000-07:00

last week my co-editor josh and I put together a list of q's for our inaugural curbed LA interview. we thought it might be fun to actually create some original content, and act like some a-hole college journalist or something and start interviewing architects, planners, gadflys we like for the site. the first architect we approached, lorcan o'herlihy, actually said yes (but in fairness to him, he hadnt seen the questions before he agreed to do it. otherwise we might have gotten a different response). I had heard he was very open to working with dumb bloggers like us, (he did an excellent LAist interview with Jess last year) and I heard he was fiercely protective of his reputation, particularly after the MAK center debacle (understandably). so now josh and I are eagerly awaiting the results to post on curbed, and the big question mark for us: will lorcan actually answer us this:

Fuck Marry Kill: Eric Owen Moss, Frank Gehry or Thom Mayne?

He did call me to speak very highly of thom mayne, so I guess we can assume he falls into the 'marry' category. so who will he fuck and who will he kill? fingers crossed that one actually gets answered.

good things come to those who wait?

2006-07-31T15:43:00.000-07:00

so it seems that the lear center has finally released the book Ready to Share based on last year's conference. sure, it took place about 18 months ago, but better late than never. aram and I actually wrote an academic article on copyright in the music and fashion industries that is published in the book, so I'm looking forward to receiving my copy - which comes just in time for my parent's arrival. maybe now they won't think grad school was a total waste.

planning for fall

2006-07-28T17:07:00.000-07:00

it seems like summer is almost over, despite all the heat. I'm spending half of aug entertaining family guests. my parents are coming for a week, followed immediately by my sister. all haven't been out here in over 2 years. so I will most likely drag all of them to the schindler house to get my tour (I keep my blogging a secret from my parents but not my docent duties). plus, I love playing tour guide - I truly do. I'm taking my parents to the hollywood bowl, we have dinner resevations at AOC, and I plan on asking john and jack to join us for dim sum in SGV. (john - ocean star?)

sept is the hard part to plan. I have a wedding in ny towards the end and I'm mostl likely speaking at a conf in ny around the same time. in mid-oct my father is in all probability having back surgery so I want to be there for the 4 days he's in the hospital. so here is my conundrum: do I just stay in new york, work from there, meet with clients/potential clients and couch surf between friends' apts and my parent's house? or do I fly back to LA and then go out to ny again mid oct? and did I mention I also have to go to ny in nov to speak at another conference? and here is what's calling me back - the Silver Lake architecture tour. which is just silly, bc I go to tours for free all the time with the schindler house, I've already been to Silvertop in the past year, and this thing costs $75 without the reception. can architecture be an addiction? because maybe I need to go cold turkey.

mission almost accomplished

2006-07-27T20:31:00.000-07:00

yesterday josh and I had drinks with a couple of people from CIM, who are going head to head with the scientologists in the hollywood land grab. (that giant condom on sunset? yup, that's CIM). and not sure I mentioned this, but in the grand tradition of informality + blogging, I've somehow been upgraded to co-editor at curbed LA. my mother would be so proud if I actually told her I blogged. its still a shameful family secret.

anyway, josh and I met with these nice folks, who invited us out purely because they liked our blog. that was it, no other reason. we were semi-shocked. our constant verbal diarrhea is actually appreciated by suits at mega-developer corporations. we were hoping for some good gossip but these people are like the mob. I think their MBA graduation ceremony includes a vow of omerta. no nasty stories about the kor grou p. no juicy gossip on the scientologists. not even a bad word to say about diva architects. I mean, really. we already know who the divas are, just spill it.

however, they kindly paid for our food and drinks (or rather, CIM did) and as josh points out, if we can occasionally convince people richer than us to pay the tab, our job here is done.

another grand intervention

2006-07-27T13:16:00.000-07:00

the lear center is holding another public meeting and workshop on the grand ave park:

Come One, Come All!
Grand Avenue Civic Park
Public Meeting & Workshop #2
PLEASE NOTE DATE CHANGE

10am - 12:30pm, Saturday, August 19, 2006
National Center for the Preservation of Democracy

111 North Central Avenue
Between Temple & 1st
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Watch the Webcast on www.grandintervention.org

Please join us in Little Tokyo for the second in a series of community workshops. The program -- organized by the official Grand Avenue Park design team, led by Brenda Levin, Mark Rios and Aaron Paley -- will include a presentation of initial design concepts that synthesize the ideas and principles generated in the first workshop. Participants at the workshop and those attending online will have the opportunity to give feedback to the design team.

Please join us in person or online for this exciting experiment in civic engagement and design.

Download the August 19 flyer

Watch video or read a transcript of the first Community Workshop

Check out the Civic Park Work Plan

Read the Draft EIR Report and add your comments (Deadline: August 3)

holy. fucking. shit.

2006-07-26T11:34:00.000-07:00

Herzog and de Meuron's new renderings for the Tate Modern's extension.
apparently, they wanted to do a 180 from their design for the original museum. mission accomplished.

its too hot to blog

2006-07-24T20:52:00.000-07:00

almost. I've been spending as little time as possible at home since I have no AC. what time I do spend here is usually in the dark (lamps add too much heat), splayed across the couch, quietly moaning and sweating. and totally not in a sexy way. more in a kvetchy way. and I now depend on the kindness of friends who have let me couch surf the last few nights just to sleep in AC. tomorrow my window unit should be installed and I'm fairly certain my little 6,000 BTU unit will be the proverbial straw on the grid's back and we'll all go black. and john can blame the malthusian catastrophe we face on me. he's certain we're heading there.
anyway, this weekend was not without a little bit of architecture. I blogged on curbed LA last week about the skirt exhibition at the prada store. jess and I decided to check it out on sat and while I mocked the LA Times' search for deeper meaning, I have to say, those were some gorgeous skirts. and we have to hand it to OMA, those architects know a thing or two about mounting an exhibition. they twirl, they swirl, they sway in the (non-existant) breeze. there is an emphasis on the quality and workmanship - some of the skirts have multiple magnifying glasses strategically positioned to highlight the beading, or materials, or design. Its a perfect embodiment of what Hal Foster argues in "Design and Crime" - architecture and design have subsumed art and criticism as the privileged discipline's of contemporary visual culture. And as the prada exhibition proves, its a domain that is no longer exclusive to the rich (although only the very rich can actually afford these skirts, the store - and exhibit - is open to all). more inportant that financial capital is cultural capital to "appreciate" these spaces. I'm going to go all grad school on your ass, and use a quote I depended on in my thesis from foster:

Might this ‘designed subject’ be the unintended offspring of the ‘constructed subject’ so vaunted in postmodern culture? One thing seems clear: just when you thought the consumerist loop could get no tighter in its narcissistic logic, it did: design abets a near-perfect circuit of production and consumption, without much ‘running-room’ for anything else.

for what its worth, foster is one of the only theorists I still remember and defer to from grad school and his book is totally readable even to the layperson.
but we didn't just stop at the prada store. we also stopped into the georg jensen store down the block to check out tadao ando's design. And look, ma! No concrete! yes, its icy cool, minimalist and very very blue, but tadao seems to have given up his signature material on rodeo drive. surprisingly, the store only seems to feature their very expensive jewelry in the individual cases and there is none of their housewares to be found. according to the press release, the glass cubes can rise and descend so salespeople can show customers the jewelry from the cases. still, we were left feeling a little 'eh.' especially after just having been to the prada store. if these stores were celebrities prada would be angelina jolie - vibrant, sexy, every time you look you hope to discover something new. and georg jensen, well, I hate to go for the obvious jennifer aniston comparison so let's go with gwyneth paltrow - restrained, minimal, classy but maybe a little boring.

I'm just waiting for the retail equivalent of paris hilton to open up in LA. oh wait, its coming to melrose.

almost over my sarah vowell obsession

2006-07-17T19:48:00.000-07:00

or at least, I'm taking a break from it. finished the partly cloudy patriot this weekend, and I was right, I didn't love it the way I loved assassination vacation. assassination vacation just felt more coherent to me (which is perhaps unfair since partly cloudy is a collection of essays, after all). but I laughed. and overall, she's a pretty persuasive essayist. she's correct - Gore could have learned a lot from Buffy the Vampire Slayer about embracing his inner nerd.

anyway, onto The Plot Against America, right after I finish reading the august issue of Lucky, which for some reason is taking me an embarassingly long time to finish. (anything more than a day is embarassing).

and sitting on my bedside desk is a book John loaned me (although I don't recall ever asking to borrow it but he INSISTS I will love it): American Theocracy. and while I'm sure it will make me a much better person to understand how deeply ingrained religion is into our current political and cultural climate, its still about 100 degrees in my apartment and I'm afraid it will just annoy me. its big and heavy and hardcover and just thinking about it makes my jaw clench. maybe I'll save it for cooler weather, esp since it looks like I may spend 2 or 3 weeks in ny in the fall. of course, its size makes it an unlikely travel companion. (flashback: the 3 months it took me to read The Corrections because I couldn't carry it on the subway). anyone know if there is a cliff notes version?

habitat 825 update

2006-07-17T08:07:00.000-07:00

I actually remembered to bring my camera with me to the schindler house this weekend so I can photograph progress on habitat 825. its been a while since my last update. the obvious progress since my last update: the exterior sheathing is now up - and I spotted a few windows on the lower floors are already installed. here are the photos:

the prodigy speaks

2006-07-13T15:31:00.000-07:00

because they asked nicely, and I used all my LA-centric material on curbed today, here's a link to josh prince-ramus speaking at the TED conference. apparently, BMW is sponsoring the TEDtalks web site - I guess they're all up in architecture's grill since zaha's new headquarters for them is getting rave reviews. and let's face it - innovation is a pretty compelling marketing message.

docenting

2006-07-12T15:58:00.000-07:00

its been a month already since I last had my docent duties at the schindler house. so sat I'll be there from 11am to 2:30 - tours are included with admission. I know I'm biased but its totally worth checking out. so little of LA's iconic architecture is open to the public - you can make an appt to see the VDL house, you can walk around the outside of the eames house, and you can visit hollyhock. that's pretty much it. so take advantage of the little LA has to offer in the way of publicly available private residences.

roses and rauschenberg

2006-07-09T10:39:00.000-07:00

yesterday, in the ridiculous heat, john, jack and I visited the huntington library and gardens in pasadena. I had never been before, and even though john had, a few landscape architects he knows recommended he go back to see the desert garden. below, a few pix he took at the gardens.

the desert garden

lotus flowers

apparently, they've hung the mona lisa in the men's room.
that's how you know its a classy museum.

and last night, stopped by moca for the rauschenberg show. not a huge fan of the rauschenberg show, but was far more impressed by the small lorna simpson show. actually, what impressed me most was how well dressed everyone there was, esp for LA and esp womens' shoes. I saw some great footwear there, including a woman with the same mobius shoes designed by koolhaas' nephew that I have. mine kill, and I can't imagine spending a few hours walking in a museum with them on - they're strictly "drive, valet, sit" shoes. god bless her and her future orthopedic surgeon.

my summer reading list

2006-07-07T17:47:00.000-07:00

over the weekend I finished assassination vacation, sarah vowell's wonderful travelogue/historical rumination on (as the title implies) assassinations past. Specifically, lincoln's, garfield's and mckinley's assassinations - which took place over a 36 year period. pretty condensed in our overall history - and all took place before any of my forefathers or mothers made their way to this country. vowell is wry, witty and self-deprecating - yet she also manages to humanize not just the presidents, their wives and children, but also their political adversaries, their enemies and their killers. its a great summer read - maybe not light chick-lit beach reading - but so much of it painfully echoes our political situation today - extreme political polarization, imperialist "interventions" (I'm looking at you, mckinley), a misled and misleading media, and religious justifications for war, tyranny and oppression. how little we learn. all wrapped up in an incredibly funny book. No, really! Assassinations are a hoot!

I actually liked it so much, I dragged out those last 20 pages so it wouldnt end too soon. But, alas, all good things must end. So I went to the bookstore and picked up The Partly Cloudy Patriot, vowell's collection of essays that preceded Assassination Vacation. And the very first essay is all about Gettysburg! its a testament to her writing (or perhaps my geekiness) that I was beyond excited to find the first chapter took us back to her favorite philosopher/writer/politician. And she visits Gettysburg with her old friend Bennet, who makes frequent appearances as her travel companion in Assassination Vacation. it was like coming home to old friends. Now the question is - will this book live up to the standard set by the first one I read? will I be chasing the dragon - as so often happens whenever I discover something I love for the first time - The OC, shanghai soup dumplings, John Lautner, the Barneys Warehouse Sale? Will second, third and fourth experiences ever live up to the initial, giddy blush of excitement and infatuation you feel the first time? only time will tell...

p.s. I also bought roth's The Plot Against America - more light summer reading! about nazis! But since I havent started it and its been ages since I read my last roth book, I'll withhold commentary for now.

keywords that brought you here

2006-07-05T15:30:00.000-07:00

I'm taking the easy way out today, as I struggle to catch up on a few works projects. a few of the more interesting ones recently:

$7 million subsidy for los angeles downtown supermarket
great hollywood walkabout john
non mobile homes in parks
tujunga as the place of invaders from space
terra banks in panties [I love typos]
brad pitts home and distance from malibu pier [This was too specific not to include]
malibu ca millionaire row
r m schindler building the slope
don johnson address los angeles [stalker. with bad taste.]
challenge independent contractor status merchandiser
minimize the bust workout [I wish that were my problem]
jessica biel's address brentwood [stalker. with mediocre taste.]
20,971 number of damien hurst's badges sold in tate modern shop.
non tipping salon sarasota
mudslide in bel-air, ca. in 1971
eric owen moss sucks [Duh.]
denim cutoffs gallery
ebay cheerleader santa barbara
providence ri pizza rating
peter eisenmann vagina [Awesome.]

podcasting...

2006-06-30T09:50:00.000-07:00

did a short interview yesterday on adtech connect radio with susan bratton in anticipation of a panel I'm moderating in november at adtech. discussed some upcoming research projects, the indecency fines bill approved by the house, and what it was like in the early days of the internet boom. description here:

Title: Roving Eyes and Little People

Susan Bratton interviews Matt Wasserlauf, CEO of Broadband Enterprises; Marissa, Founder and Managing Partner of Radar Research and Len Ostroff, CEO of Rovion in a show focused on broadband, video, marketing mash-ups and more.

Find out about a dog whistle only teens can hear, be in-the-know about the latest practical joke on YouTube and an intelligent new scoring index for Web 2.0 companies. Emotion meets accountability with hotspot and borderless streaming video ad formats you might actually like…plus cool little talking web people.

listen here.

how hot is it?

2006-06-28T16:44:00.000-07:00

I think my apartment is about 300 degrees today. my lack of air conditioning is beginning to make me feel very european, and not in a good way. next thing you know I'll want socialized health care and listen to bad 80s pop. oh wait...

did I mention we also went to the hockney exhibition?

2006-06-27T11:50:00.000-07:00

back in the winter of 93/94 I was an intern at the holly solomon gallery in new york. when I was working there, I went to an opening at a nearby gallery of work by david hockney and met him. he was old even back then, and hard of hearing but very sweet and gracious enough to talk to some anonymous intern. now, everytime I fly into LA and look down at a landscape dotted with swimming pools, I think back to that meeting and how when he landed here, he saw the same landscape that inspired his most frequent subject.

around the same time, in LA, john also coincidentally met hockney. I've known john for 2 years now and its odd that we just discovered we both met one of the most preeminent artists of the 20th century just a few days apart. what makes it even stranger, john had just gotten thru introducing me to Vonnegut's idea of karass as we had stood in line for Klimt, outside of our discussion of the exhibit. so now we're convinced we're somehow on the same team, moving towards an unknown, or unknowable, goal. me: straight, short, neurotic jew from new york. him: gay, tall, paranoid texan, doppelganger for hugh grant. but we're on the same team.

David Hockney
Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy
1970-71
Tate, London

anyway, that was my convoluted way of introducing this article about the exhibition, that points out the complicated relationship between artist and collector/patron (holly required all of her artists to do a portrait of her - she had a rotating gallery in her office of warhol silkscreens, lichtenstein's comic book representation of her, mapplethorpe's photo, etc). what makes is especially poignant was that one of our favorite pieces in the exhibition, Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy, has such an affecting story behind it:

A third painting, Mr. and Mrs. Clark and Percy (1970-71), another example of Hockney’s "double portrait" series, is Hockney’s famous painting of the husband-and-wife team of Celia Birtwell and Ossie Clark, celebrated fashion designers during the Swinging Sixties in London. Birtwell, a longtime Hockney muse, has recently reignited her career as a designer, thanks in part to another London fashion fad, the Topshop fashion chain. As for Clark, his story is less happy. He fell into bankruptcy and drug addiction in the 1980s and was murdered by his (male) lover in 1996. For those who know the off-screen details, the tension between the two sitters, which seems to reach out and include the artist, is disquieting, to say the least.

its a massive exhibit - it really goes on forever and John and I were already worn out from the Klimt show, so I think I need to go back when I have more time and patience to really make my way through the whole show.

what have I become?

2006-06-26T10:07:00.000-07:00

this weekend I realized exctly how much of a cliche I've become. Observe:

read: assassination vacation
watched: wordplay
attended: "The Jewish Identity Project" and "Rwanda: After, Darfur: Now" at the Skirball, the Klimt exhibition at LACMA.

and I loved each and every one. Only halfway through Vowell's book, but her wry, self-depracating writing about the first three presidential assassinations in the US is fascinating. Wordplay is a warm, funny documentary about crossword puzzle freaks - if you saw Spellbound - this movie is basically what those kids grew up to be (and it made me miss that element of new york that is totally unencumbered by any desire to be "cool" and completely happy in their own nerdiness - not sure I've found that here yet).

the Jewish Identity project was suprisingly good - asking what exactly is a Jew in an age of multiculturalism and hyper-globalization. And how does that self-perception change from one generation to the next, particularly in families that went through the Holocaust (pretty much ripped from a page in my family's history). And Darfur, while timely and relevant, didn't really shed much light on anything I haven't already read in the press. Juxtaposing it with images of Rwanda's genocide brings the message home, and its hard not to feel something looking at the images of malnourished children, but I blame Sally Struthers for inundating us with similar images, then innoculating us to them. The photos just seemed to lack a real narrative, or emotional heft. or am I just cold?

which brings me to Klimt, which closes on the 30th. If you're in LA, Go. Before it closes. the lines were monstrous, they move slowly, the exhibition is packed. but its worth every annoying inconvenience. Reproductions just dont capture the colors, the layers, the vibrancy of his work. And going with john, he loved to point out how this painting could be read:

ok, prepare for art analysis 101: John pointed out that Adele Bloch-Bauer's figure can be read as both a phallus or a yoni. the dual drapes of her coat look like labia, or if read as a phallus, then her head looks like its "penetrating" the dark hole of her hat. but john doesn't like to stop there - he also likes to wax poetic on one of his favorite topics: the interplay of sex and death. Adele's pallor, her vacuous stare, lend the painting a funereal quality. we didn't even get around to trying to analyze the apparent orientalism going on in the background.

but after reading the history of the exhibition - the struggle to recover the klimt's back from the Austrian government after they were stolen by the Nazis - slaps us with the irony of finally being able to see these works just as our own country struggles with an imperialist war. yup, sweet, sweet irony.

oh, and I finally saw the dodgers actually win a game this weekend.

they like me, they really like me!

2006-06-22T11:34:00.000-07:00

just saw LAist's link to a post I wrote on curbed re: travis barker selling his home in holmby hills. and tony referred to me as "super-hot" - not sure if he's referring to my writing or my ass. either way, I'll take the compliment. thanks, tony!

mariachi, taiko and...park planning?

2006-06-20T12:03:00.000-07:00

it seems LA's residents even need to be entertained when discussing urban planning. got this email about tomorrow's public meeting to plan the grand ave park:

Come help envision A NEW CIVIC PARK extending from the Music Center to
City Hall!!!!

PUBLIC MEETING AND WORKSHOP: Wednesday, June 21st, 5:30-7:30 pm

JOIN US AT THE COURT OF FLAGS: 210 N. Hill Street: At the mall between Hill & Broadway

Ride the Metro Red Line: Exit at Civic Center/Tom Bradley Station

PARK FREE at Music Center: Enter on Grand, tell the attendant you're here for the "Civic Park Workshop"

Take the survey online and help set the priorities for parkprogramming
and uses: www.grandavenuecommittee.org

Schedule of the Day:

11:30 to 5:30 See the display boards and vote for your favorite park uses.

12 noon Enjoy the sounds of a Mariachi trio

12:15 and 4:00 Take a walking tour with a design team member

5:00 Watch a Taiko Drum performance by Japanese Festival Sounds

5:30 to 7:30 Participate in the Public Meeting and Workshop

For all questions and to RSVP call 213.891.2964 or emailrsvp@grandavenuecommittee.org.
If you require translation services for the workshop, you must RSVP and indicate the services necessary at that time.

Can't make the workshop? Participate online!!

Watch a webcast of the workshop and post comments/questions at www.grandintervention.org.

In an effort to extend its public outreach, the Grand Avenue Committee and The Related Companies are endorsing event webcasting and online civic engagement efforts by the Norman Lear Center at the USC Annenburg School.

hollywood's revitalization

2006-06-19T12:43:00.000-07:00

not a lot of architecture stuff lately since I was hosting my BFF from new york this past weekend. and he can care less about architecture, so we instead spent the weekend at the beach, at the bars, and watching world cup soccer. I'm still confused about offsides and how a tie can be a loss, but I'm learning. and anyway, those players are HOT. seriously. so spending a few hours at duke's in malibu watching the game was far less painful than I thought it would be.

and I'm making strides on catching up with my reading. finally finished sore winners (great pop culture/political analysis using bush as a prism for contemporary cultural analysis), sped through the devil wears prada (what? I needed a little candy after sore winners. and it IS candy. terribly written, rambling, pointless, one-dimensional delicious candy), and am now concurrently reading assassination vacation (I wish sarah vowell and I could hang) and The Big Oyster: history on the half shell, a social and political history of the development of New York City, told through the lens of the history of the oyster industry. doesn't sound exciting? weirdly, it is completely fascinating because kurlansky excels at describing history through food. salt was a page turner.

I'm also reading through back issues of Los Angeles magazine. read through the issue on Hollywood last night and was struck by a comment in one of the articles on its revitalization. I'm paraphrasing but they were discussing the periodic publicity campaigns the hollywood chamber of commerce embarks on to herald its imminent revitalization. one component of each campaign: a pointless walk-through for journalists through the neighborhood. and then I got this email:

Hi friends and fellow walkers-

I am working with Alison Becker of Council President Eric Garcetti's Office and the Dept of City Planning on a Walkability Study of the Hollywood Community Plan area. We are conducting a Walk Audit of the major streets in the plan area to review the current build out of the street VS the street designation of each street. We will be sponsoring a grand event that we are calling "The Great Hollywood Walkabout" which will take place on Saturday June 24th from 8:30 AM - 1:00 PM with community volunteers.

Anyway, we are looking to develop new street designations as part of the Hollywood Community Plan Update that help to retain as much of the existing positive character of these streets as possible. The new street designations would be specific to Hollywood and become formally adopted street standards. If appropriate these new street standards can be adopted for other community plan areas as those plans are revised.

The way that we are going to get to the new street designations is to gather community support during the walkabout. We will evaluate the current walking conditions and character defining qualities of the important streets in the plan area.

Why am I telling you all of this? Well I need your help on the day of the Walkabout to facilitate groups of community volunteers for the walk audits. The event will start off with a training session for the community volunteers on what makes a great and walkable street. We will then break into groups and travel by public transportation to each of the streets that we have selected. We will utilize a Walkability Checklist that I will develop to evaluate each block face in the area.

Can I count on you to help keep Hollywood Walkable and to make it more walkable in the future? If so, we need professional volunteers in various areas of Hollywood, such as Downtown Hollywood - Hollywood Blvd. from La Brea Avenue to Gower Street, Sunset Blvd. La Brea to the Hollywood Fwy and others; in East Hollywood along Western Avenue, Vermont Avenue, Hillhurst Avenue and other streets.

Please respond to my email with which streets you would like to help lead a group of community members on or if you have any questions. Please pass on my email to others who may be interested.

We are at a turning point on these issues in Los Angeles and it will take the effort of all us to make it happen. You can walk the walk and make a difference or just talk the talk and see our streets destroyed parcel by parcel.

Thanks for your dedication to Los Angeles,
--
Deborah Murphy, Associate AIA
Deborah Murphy Urban Design + Planning
2351 Silver Ridge Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90039

upcoming events

2006-06-15T11:20:00.000-07:00

since curbed discourages event listings:

The Los Angeles Forum for Architecture and Urban Design kicks off its annual summer On the Map series on Thursday, June 15, 2006 at 7pm. "On The Map" is an annual tour of recently completed design projects that are presented on site by the architect/s. The events are open to the public. There is an admittance fee of $15 for non-members per event. The events are free for LA Forum members. Attendees can join the Forum the night of the event or on our website: www.laforum.org.

The 2006 OTM series schedule is as follows:
All events start at 7pm on Thursdays.

June 15
Touraine + Richmond
One Window House
2129 Linden Avenue, Venice, 90291

June 22
Lee + Mundwiler
Urban Beach House
7 Vicente Terrace, Santa Monica 90401

June 29
Cigolle X Coleman
TR-1 House and Studio
17463 Tramonto Drive, Pacific Palisades 90272

July 13
Joe Day
deegan-day design studio
2450 West Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles 90026

July 20
Daly, Genik
Artist's Studio
2416 Hidalgo Avenue, Los Angeles 90039

July 27
Tom Marble and Pae White
White Marble Residence
4027 Paige Street, Montecito Heights 90031

Aug 3
Assembledge
Ridgewood Residence
385 North Ridgewood Place, Los Angeles 90004

From the Norman Lear Center:
Grand Avenue Civic Park Community Workshop
5:30pm Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Court of Flags

224 North Hill Street
Between Temple &amp 1st
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Watch the Webcast on www.grandintervention.org

Please join us at the Grand Avenue Civic Park on June 21st for the first in a series of community workshops. The program -- organized by the official Grand Avenue Park design team, led by Brenda Levin, Mark Rios and Aaron Paley -- will include a day's worth of outdoor activities:

11:30am - 1:30pm: Food stalls and walking tours of the park site

5:00pm - 5:30pm: Musical performance

5:30pm - 7:30pm: Public meeting

The goal of the public meeting will be to gather feedback from potential Civic Park users, solicit community input and develop key principles for the project. This is a chance for everyone's voice to be heard.

swell shots

2006-06-12T22:47:00.000-07:00

this weekend was kind of packed with architecture and food stuff. I had been complaining the last few times I was a docent at the schindler house that visitorship was sparse at best. Not so on sat. it was non-stop because of the AIA convention. be careful what you wish for... it was the busiest weekend I can remember in a long time. and one of the toughest - I was bombarded by questions by architects on construction techniques that I couldn't answer. Ask me about the program, the social history, gossip about schindler and neutra - I'm happy to answer. Just don't ask me about studs.

sat evening john and I headed down to the 2x8 swell show at the gas company lofts. I posted his pics on curbed today. sort of a disappointing event since we couldn't go up to the lofts and didn't win the vespa we were sure was ours. I would even have been happy with the spa weekend at the beverly regent but no luck. we loved the grand hall of the gas company building - still in the middle of restoration. we loved the lit-from-within banana-shaped inflatable chairs.

strangely, at dinner later that night I ran into some of the architects I had given tours to earlier in the day. LA is starting to turn into a small town.

this week there will be nothing architecture-related, I hope. instead, it will be all about work, the last week of the everybody wins program for the semester, hosting a friend from new york, and saying goodbye to matteo as he heads off to ny to work at richard meier's PR agency. with his perry street apartments referred to as "faulty towers" they have their work cut out for them.

and I never did make it sunday night to his friend's house in the hills. just too hard to squeeze in, between sunday supper at lucques and the premiere of entourage. oh well.

docenting

2006-06-10T10:27:00.000-07:00

did I mention my monthly docent duties at the schindler house are today? I'm hoping it will be slightly busier than the last couple of times - which competed with inclement weather and LA Times Book Festivals and Coachellas - making attendence at the house a trickle at best.

last night attended the design guide event at the new A+D Museum. missed everything at lacma and ace gallery and just spent a little time at the new museum. the event was just ok - impressive amount of money spent on an event completely open to the public, including the open bar and brazilian band, but it all felt a little forced. maybe I was just feeling off. I dont know.

tonight john and I are attending the 2x8 swell thing at the gas company lofts downtown and we're far more excited about the lofts than the student work, but maybe we'll be pleasantly surprised.

to top off the theme of this weekend, I promised matteo I would stop by his friend's house in the hills tomorrow night to see the house while mtv italia shoots a promo or something there. as usual, I'm fuzzy on the details, but matteo insists I'll love the house. at some point this weekend, I also need to finish an article on media planning due mon. fun.

all schindler, all the time

2006-06-08T17:23:00.000-07:00

spent a few hours today volunteering at one of the AIA conference tours, helping the schindler house. so I got to see schindler's erlik hous e and went to see the fitzpatrick house again. but with the new owner of the erlik house uncomfortable with even personal photography of the house, I only took a few exterior shots I'll upload eventually. and I didn't bother with the fitzpatrick house since I took so many photos last time. the erlik house was gutted a couple of years ago and completely redone, but was faithful to schindler's original specs. what was surprising to me was how much I liked it - its one of his last (done in 1951 - he died in 1953) and I tend to like his earlier stuff much better but this was just a jewel box of a house. small, bright, airy and light - with some typical schindler touches like clerestory windows, recessed bathroom skylights, complex interlocking spaces, and wood built-ins. I wish I had some photos of the interior.

anyway, got this notice about upcoming music events at the schindler house on kings road this summer:

The MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House is pleased to host another summer of

sound. at the Schindler House

Produced by The Society for the Activation of Social Space through Art and Sound (SASSAS)

Saturday, June 24
TETUZI AKIYAMA
The first Los Angeles concert by the renowned Tokyo based guitar improviser known for work ranging from the spare acoustic reductionism of "onkyo" to hell-on-the-highway inspired electric boogie.

Saturday, July 29
YUKO NEXUS6
Using voice, cassettes and her laptop "as an old out of tune guitar," Yuko Nexus6 revels in fusing the ridiculous with the sublime to create songs which cling to the mind like anxious dreams.

Friday, August 25
A TRIBUTE TO THE SOUNDS OF FORBIDDEN PLANET
Celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Louis and Bebe Barron's otherworldly soundtrack with four composers still under its spell: Thomas Dimuzio, Tom Grimley, Sukho Lee and David Rothbaum.

Doors open at 7:00 p.m.
Performances begin at 7:30 p.m.

Advance admission: $18; $14 for students with valid I.D., Friends of the Schindler House and SASSAS (The Society for the Activation of Social Space through Art and Sound) members; $25 at the door.

Space is limited. Advance ticket purchase recommended.
Purchase tickets via SASSAS’s soundNet website: www.soundNet.org/sound/2006

Presented in association with

MAK Center for Art and Architecture

then and now

2006-06-07T18:43:00.000-07:00

the guggenheim then:

the guggenheim now:

apparently undergoing a 2 year, $25 million renovation, with new climate control, security systems and I believe I read something on the scaffolding about restoring FLW's original facade and color.

back to sunny LA

2006-06-06T21:36:00.000-07:00

what I managed to accomplish in less than a week in ny:

cook dinner for my parents
attend my high school reunion
celebrate my mother's birthday
meet with clients
catch up with old friends
take my little sister to dinner
lombardi's
xiao long bao
anglomania at the met, the flatware exhibit at the cooper hewitt (both are excellent)
finish the second half of sore winners (the first half took 4 months, second half 4 days. sometimes I miss commuting.)
blow out a tire on the BQE

what I did not accomplish (and wish I had more time to)

eat at babbo
go to the zaha hadid exhibit at the guggenheim
see a few more friends, meet a few more clients
go anywhere near the meatpacking district (bc of an interest in design and architecture, of course. no other reason.)

topic brought up in every conversation in new york, regardless of who you are talking to:

the gehry/ratner atlantic yards project
soaring real estate costs/brooklyn's gentrification (but this one is evergreen)
an inconvenient truth, but truthfully, that may have been my own fault

total time I've seen the sun:

I believe there was a half hour or so late monday afternoon

it will be good to be back in LA.

LA art: the good, the bad and the stolen

2006-05-31T17:16:00.000-07:00

Artkrush sent out their bi-monthly (or is it biweekly? I forget. whichever means every other week) email newsletter and lo and behold, this week's issue is all about LA:

To trace the growth of the current scene, we touch on the city's prominent artists and profile the young abstract painter Mark Grotjahn. We interview Ann Philbin, director of UCLA's Hammer Museum, about her transformation of the institution into a cutting-edge source for underground art. The SoCal art journal ANP Quarterly is our media pick this issue, and solo shows of Shahzia Sikander and Abbas Kiarostami round out our survey of current exhibits.

But if you really need evidence of LA's thriving art scene (and collector community), check out the LAPD's Art Theft Crime Repor t, which lists art crimes that include a Man Ray photograph, a letter from Ayn Rand, and a 600 pound victorian gate that have all been swiped. awesome.

off to new york tomorrow for a week, so hoping to at least catch the AngloMania exhibit at the Met and the flatware exhibit at the cooper hewitt. yes, I want to see a show about forks. but with birthdays, family obligations, a high school reunion, several meetings and work to do, not sure how much time I'll have. at least I know I'm in for a couple of great meals.

neutra open house - photos for your viewing pleasure

2006-05-30T11:55:00.000-07:00

John, a friend of his, and I went to the Neutra open house for the Poster Apartments in north hollywood this weekend. Neutra built the low- to -middle income apartments in 1960, they're now renovated and each apartment was given a "makeover" by local design/build firms and furniture stores such as modernica, built, and steve king. Our favorite: the apartment done by 'built' - they did the interior design for magnolia and the upcoming royale. also impressive: the custom zebrawood cabinetry done by steve king. A few pictures below:

The pool. Duh.

The custom made zebrawood cabinet by Steve King. Lots of hidden drawers.

Exterior of the apartment building.

Don't you want to hang out here? We did - and not just because they served us drinks and cookies. This apartment was done by 'built.'

Mid Century modern = de rigeur mobile.

I love this planter.

I also love antlers.

when in north hollywood, do as the thai do.
lunch at wat thai temple, with scorchingly hot papaya salad.

more photos on flickr.

keywords that brought you here

2006-05-27T09:55:00.000-07:00

some of the better ones:

paul rudolph westin atlanta
abc carpet and home cole children died
inner workings of kostabi world
frank.gehry photograph ed.moses
cinetic median frank gehry
providence ri pizza rating
hgtv manhattan loft look asian
greek columns cerritos
controversy, issues with boccioni's unique forms of continuity and space
reviews on kcrw frances anderton: what would jane jacobs have thought of grand avenue?
peter eisenmann vagina
rude driver cities ranked
mid-century brad pitt
sacramento skid row 1952
mics apartment/porn
walker art building justification of museum expansion
sunland tujunga pre war racism
female obesity, urban spaces, relation
the guggenheim museum bilbao affect on housing ,land prices
minihorses for therapy
tia carrere's free porn film
when is ed moses 80 birthday?
jessica simpsons residence in beverly hills.
rick rubin, address, hollywood hills, california
hollywoodstars love to
pissarro hillside cattle

neutra's open house

2006-05-25T13:57:00.000-07:00

I dont know how much of this weekend will involved beach, barbeque or any of the other traditional memorial day pasttimes. last night I was invited to what I thought was a pre-memorial day cookout with burgers and beer but shame on me for skimming the email. instead it became dubbed "le cookout" with pate, grilled t-bones, a cheese course, handmade custard in hollowed-out lemons and copious amounts of wine. so I'm moving slowly today. but I digress. onto this weekend - I wasn't going to post about this until after I went, but since its listed in today's nytimes and there's a feature article in today's latimes, I might as well mention it. the proverbial cat is out of the bag and has run up the tree:
Design House Showcase at "Poster Neutra"
Modernica, Tom&John Reistetter, NoHo Modern, Cletus Dalglish, Sunset Orange, Steven King, Built

Sat&Sun, May 27-28, 10AM-4PM @ 6847 Radford Ave, 91605

Ten dollar admission with all proceeds going to Neutra's VDL House in Silverlake, owned and operated by Cal Poly, Pomona

More info and registration here: Not-a-box.net

habitat 825 update: May 2006

2006-05-24T19:21:00.000-07:00

its been almost 2 months since I've gone by the schindler house, with a camera, and remembered to actually photograph habitat 825 next door. shame on me. actually, looking back to march, progress doesn't seem to be as rapid as the first few months of construction, or maybe I'm just not paying attention. anyway, in the past two months, lorcan seems to be everywhere since completing the Jai House: architectural record, living etc, an award from the LA Business Council. so it will be interesting to see what sort of media reception habitat 825 will get once its completed. will its proximity to the schindler house, and the ensuing controversy, have any effect? who knows - but here are the photos.

best museum show so far this summer

2006-05-22T09:37:00.000-07:00

matteo and I went to the hammer on sat to check out the societe anonyme exhibition. it seems like every summer, the hammer shames the getty. last summer's sculpture exhibition THING at the hammer was better than anything I saw at the getty, and the speaker series last year meant we got to see malcolm gladwell, david byrne and rem koolhaas (not all together but I would probably pay a lot to see those 3 on stage at the same time).

anyway, societe anonyme features the work of duchamp, ernst, kandinsky, leger and many many others, as well as much of the ephemera of the societe - letters between duchamp and katherine dreier, exhibition catalogues, manifestos, etc.

on sat matteo and I stuck around for the chamber music concert as well - Les Six - disciples of Erik Satie. when matteo proposed staying for a concert of 1920s parisian avant garde music, I was ready to run, but very glad I stayed (altho I skipped the film screening). the exhibition is here until aug - totally worth checking out.

end of the week architecture stuff

2006-05-19T17:28:00.001-07:00

went to the mackey reception last week - not much to report there. its a beautiful renovation, esp the use of schindler's original paint colors for the built-ins. skipped the speeched on the roof and opted for champagne in the garden instead. no regrets there.

last night attended lacma's LA Parks and Wrecks lecture. Leaving aside the fact that is was poorly choreographed - I had hoped for a discussion but we got a series of presentations instead - the speakers were actually quite good. Marty Kaplan did a great job of presenting not just the impetus behind the Grand Intervention campaign, but also many of the submissions. The ones by children (many residents of Skid Row) were both the most heartbreaking and the coolest - one wanted a bridge over a shark pool, while another thought they should build a jail. While the official deadline for submissions is long past, johanna says the lear center is still willing to accept new ones for their web site.
Mario Ybarra, Jr. had a somewhat rambling presentation on his work for lacma's exhibition Consider This on "forgotten" public spaces that are co-opted for use as park land and canvases for creative expression - specifically Belmont Park.

Mark Rios presented some of his firms landscape architecture projects. I've been now to many many lectures by architects and urban theorists (because I'm a masochist). There have only been a few that have struck me as considered, thoughtful, articulate and intelligent while eschewing the super-sized ego of so many starchitects. Mark Rios is one of the them (Doug Suisman is the other that comes to mind). what do they have in common? they dont just design buildings - they also design landscapes and concern themselves with context, history and culture. and while I have a few problems with Rios' schematic on the factors that create homogenous design, I love his approach and his presentation. Its always exciting to see the process behind the program, and Rios offered us a glimpse into that. He's interested in ecology, in culture, in ethnographic research. (actually, now that I think about it, koolhaas not only has an interest in these issues as well, he's formalized it within his practice and productized it with books). whatever, rios rocked.

by the time lynne dwyer presented, the lecture was close to two hours, so my attention was sapped. something something, arroyo seco, something something. where's the wine?

q&a was cut short because of time, but it seemed like many of the questions came from activists looking to raise awareness on the fate of the south central farm. and after 2 hours of presentations on unbuilt parks like the $50 million Grand Ave park, its easy to sympathize with a group of people struggling to raise the funds to save public land that is already productive, and provides a service in a community that disproportionately suffers from illnesses such as obesity, heart disease and diabetes, stemming from a lack of healthy food. and when they asked their question - in short "what about us?" they were met with blank stares from panel. the only one who actually attempted to answer them was rios. um, did I mention rios rocks?

anyway, this weekend I have my once monthly docent duty so I'll be at the schindler house on sunday from 11-2:30 for tours.

lastly, the schindler house is coordinating some of the AIA tours for the convention next month. they're looking for volunteers for guided tours (you dont need to be an architecture expert at all - simply an enthusiast). contact them for details.

P.S. my scientology post now has the distinction of the most comments on curbed LA. who knew scientology would be such a lightning rod? hehe.

juggling blogs...

2006-05-16T18:19:00.000-07:00

its kind of hard. but thought I would link to a post I wrote today for Radar Waves that is tangentially related to the (looser and looser) theme of this blog. its a response to a recent post on design observer by michael beirut on the nature of design plagiarism.

and I also had my proudest blogging moment today. after posting on curbed LA with a link to a story on why scientology is good for hollywood architecture, we almost immediately got this comment:

Scientology is everywhere, with 18 new centers worldside in 2005 and 1 million square feet of new space added. That you would slam Scientology, a recognized religion that has the cojones to go toe-to-toe with a $1.6 Trillion industry that pushes drugs and fraudlent "diseases" to collect insurance dollars is either a lack of understanding or a comment on your inability to conceive that unlike many who are spectators having thoughts shaped by the media prostitutes (paid by major advertisers, including the drug companies), Scientlogists are actively protecting human rights and religious freedom. Go to www.infocenter2.org and get some facts.

Tom, is that you?

I think I'm now on Xenu's list of suppressives. My job here is done.

monday media: its a turvy-topsy world

2006-05-15T15:45:00.000-07:00

for some reason today, every article I come across, I think "um, are they hitting the pipe?" I generally have that reaction whenever I read anything that is by/about/quotes joel kotkin but today it seems to be everywhere.

exhibit A: suburbia makes you thin. the aussie researchers argue that big yards equals more active kids. apparently Xbox hasn't made it down under, or these researchers have never actually met any kids. maybe they just raise heartier children than the ones I see in American suburbs.

exhibit B: high gas prices will invigorate the suburbs. Joel Kotkin is on crack. for reals. every time I read his drivel I wonder how MSM takes him seriously. so maybe james howard kunstler is alarmist and his predictions sound frighteningly dire, but he cannot be dismissed outright, as kotkin does here. like a cassandra for the oil age, I'm afraid kunstler will have the last laugh. kotkin also doesn't seem to be familiar with (or chooses to ignore) theorists like saskia sassen, who argue globalized networks (of information, finances, power) privileges cities, and their importance increases even as corporate headquarters may move to lower-rent suburbs. kotkin seems to base his argument on the 70s oil crisis - which seems to bear little resemblance to the one we face today. and his comparison to Europe is just facile.

exhibit C: Bonus! more kotkin kraziness. this time, he argues that cities such as Berlin, San Francisco, Montreal and Sydney will be replaced by "no-nonsense, middlebrow places" like Reno, Phoenix, and Fort Myers, FL. I can barely bring myself to even read the rest...Why on earth does the LA Times continue to provide him with a platform for his claptrap? I might be more apt to forgive his specious conclusions if he could come close to displaying the crisp wit, rancorous bile, or irascibility of a kunstler or wolcott.