The Porch Ceiling Part 1

My latest project:

I needed to strip the paint from my porch boards (don't ask why), the tongue-and-groove beadboard that comprises the porch ceiling. I opted to remove the boards, rather than work, arms over head, heat gun a-blazin', showered by scrapings of shriveled paint.



The cavernous aperture permitted a few improvements. I installed a new header (the engineered wood product shown), ledger, and joists--2 X 6's (the span is a mere seven feet). The joists formed a pocket for insulation, and I laid 3/4 plywood on top.





Now I've reinstalled the paint-free bead board and I'm preparing to stain. I also used the opportunity to hoist plywood into the attic.

The 10th Wonder of the World

The sign says it all. A front yard art project, part folk genius, part busybody construction, part badass mysticism.



Lew, a former truck driver, began the ever-evolving installation in 1982, aided by his sister Dianne. Surf-board sized chunks of acrylic encircle mountains of metal painted black and race car red. A zebra surveys all.



The Harris's are friendly, go take a look, and drop a quarter in their donations tube:
1145 W. 62nd St.
(Two blocks West of Vermont)

Things I Found in January

I'm pretty choosy about what I pick up, but I suppose that's laughable because most people would never deign to salvage discarded building materials or consumer items.



Wool Meroni sweater (found along Frederick Street in San Francisco)




Typically I come onto things driving to and fro. In those moments, the internal monologue sounds something like this: where am I going, do I have an extra second, am I wearing clothes that can be machine washed?



Two leaded glass transoms (found near 51st St. and Main)



Sometimes like The Pile, it's a gut check. Might it depress me? More vintage house parts, bound for Sunshine Canyon or Palmdale, the wealth of a small nation heaped atop clay liners and polythylene sheeting.


New York Times Magazine from 1994, with story by H.D. Bissinger entitled, When Whites Flee (Allston & King, Berkeley)

Recycling, sure it's good. I especially like to see the recojedores piling curb-side metal onto their over-burdened flat-beds, hot water heaters cresting sidewalls, like torpedos shorn from a mothballed sub.



Kitchen grain bins (2nd Avenue near Jefferson)





In wealthy neighborhoods, like Hancock Park, the front and side yard is never used as a dumping ground, nor are items left along the parkway or curb. RV-sized dumpsters, the high status alternative, checker the landscape, hunkered down beneath porte cocheres, invading long, divided driveways.

Those darn rich people. They won't even let me get after their trash.

Classified Ads

Real Estate Classifieds from March 16, 1907



Found behind a mirror by serial restorer Roland Souza. Hours of reading fun.



Note the next ad, which requests a third ($1700) down.



The Alligator Store? See, I told you these were fun!

2171 W. 24th Street, Historic West Adams (90018)

I'm holding my first 2007 open, Tuesday, at 2171 W. 24th Street, from 11:00 am to 2:30 pm.

Kinney Heights Craftsman
3 bedrooms 1.5 baths 1,773 square feet

Wrapped in nurturing green foliage, outlined by broad, elegant woodwork and lovingly-rendered period-faithful details, this Kinney Heights Craftsman evokes a treehouse-like sense of intimacy, seclusion, and serenity.

Located on one of West Adams's most sought-after blocks, this surprisingly spacious two-story treasure with its easy 10 freeway access is ideally situated between the Westside sparkle and the dynamic Downtown.

























Bullet points:
*Oak and fir floors
*Wood burning fireplace
*Located in West Adams Terrace HPOZ
*Built in 1904
*Vintage light fixtures
*7,500 square foot lot
*Mature landscaping with outdoor entertaining areas






Offered at $695,000

The Ugliest Residential Block in Los Angeles?

One More Billboard Rant



The billboards pictured are the smaller poster panels, or "junior" panels. Although these signs are located on private property, they clearly derive their use--or value--from road traffic. (Otherwise, let them be oriented away from the commons!) They benefit from the investment society has made in roads. (To be clear, these signs are not advertising services or goods sold on-site.)


Does this not constitute a franchise on the public right-of-way?!





These images were captured on the 5800 block of San Pedro (South of Gage). A block of mostly single-story houses, dispicably checkered with off-premise outdoor advertising signs. The signs crane, giraffe-like, over preposterously high fencing and yards of barren soil, smelter waste, battery casings, and burnt clover.





An effort by landowners to maximize diminished economic abilities, a parasitical social practice, or another example of contested space in the urban landscape?

Or all of the above?

New in Jefferson Park

Heads up bungalow-buffs, I've listed an Arts & Crafts spectacular, on one of Jefferson Park's best blocks. Built in 1911, the house features never-painted woodwork, and original built-ins in five rooms! Additionally, it claims a new central heating system (with A/C!), a largely updated/re-wired electrical system, an abundant garage, and a working fireplace.



I anticipate the pricing to be in the mid $500's ($550-$570K).

If anyone knows a worthy, architecture-friendly buyer, contact me ASAP. A sign is going up today, outside marketing will follow, and I'll enter it into the multiples in two weeks.



More on this listing to come.....

Teardown Teardrops

National teardown figures have yet to be compiled, but the conservative National Association of Home Builders has estimated that 75,000 houses are razed and replaced with larger homes annually.

According to Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the hardest hit areas include Chicago's suburbs, the Beltway, the Bay Area, the Jersey Shore, and Palm Springs. Hinsdale, Illinois, a 133-year old village, 20 miles west of Chicago, has been dubbed America's Teardown Capital. About 30% of Hinsdale's 4,700 homes are "replacements".

In the many historic L.A. neighborhoods that lack protective powers (like HPOZ's), complete re-builds (what some more flatteringly refer to as "re-habs") are more common (than "teardowns"), wherein only some portion of the first-floor framing survives, or a section of roofline.



Aspiring to modernism, but achieving "cheapism", these boxey makeovers look ridiculous with their vestigial, steeply-pitched roofs, like an aging Casanova with a jet-black hair piece.



Ironically in LA's historic core, where "integrity" (meaning the intactness of the building) is most valued, these standardizing re-do's effectively constitute blight. That is, properties whose condition (or appearance) is detrimental to the social, physical, and economic well-being of a community.

Stripped of their economic-optimizing potential, these properties become less likely to attract significant future investment, sentenced to a "B" or sub-market standing.

Schoolhouse Rock

Sufferin' Till Suffrage

Synopsis: In this empowering song, a mousy girl transforms into a bell-bottom clad superwoman, and against a backdrop of vintage photos, chronicles the history of women's suffrage.




Now you have heard of Women's Rights,
And how we've tried to reach new heights.
If we're "all created equal"....
That's us too!

(Yeah!)

But you will proba...bly not recall
That it's not been too..too long at all.
Since we even had the right to
Cast a vote.

(Well!)

Well, sure, some men bowed down
and called us "Mrs." (Yeah!)
Let us hang the wash out and wash the dishes (Huh!)
But when the time rolled around to elect a president...

Pause! Enough history, enough song. Check out the floor, is that tile?!





Wow, what a floor! And to think I thought Conjunction Junction was the coolest.

Architectural Salvage of San Diego

Architectural Salvage of San Diego, is immaculately organized. Soon to expand, its current location in San Diego's Little Italy offers metal hardware, doors, plumbing fixtures, light fixtures, windows (mostly decorative transoms with leaded glass) and other remarkable cast-offs.












Architectural Salvage of San Diego
Elizabeth Scalice
1971 India Street
San Diego, CA 91201
619-696-1313

Civics Lessons

Billboards as civics lessons.

Ethical obligations, in storey-high lettering.

Sometimes these messages are sponsored by churches and civic organizations, or national foundations.

They mark territory as surely as other physical features, as surely as graffiti, possibly underscoring or deflocking special community needs or issues. The messages, incidentally, seem mostly intended for males, particularly the many advisories about parenting.

Is my community being debased by these towers of advocacy, presumed guilty, grouped into a mass, misunderstood, ghetto melange? Do outsiders presume the worst, and might those presumptions do further harm, particularly in a society guilty of uneven investment?



Should we discourage murders by chalking bodies on the sidewalk, and by using shell casings to form snowman-like eyes, ears, and mouth?

Didn't pop music used to deal with this stuff?

Favorite L.A. Movies

Saturday night, the American Cinemateque screened director Robert Mulligan's The Nickel Ride. In the Cinemateque's schedule the film was described thusly: (1974, 20th Century Fox, 99 min.) Superb neo-noir with Jason Miller as a downtown LA stolen good manager. When his boss, John Hillerman, bids him to buy more warehouses, problems snowball for Miller, threatending his 'career' and his life. Beautifully realized, from the low-key performances to the evocation of a dying downtown. With Bo Hopkins.

Gloomily photographed by Jordan Cronenweth, the Nickel Ride, counts Skid Row, Echo Park, the Biltmore, and the Olympic Auditorium amongst its many unburnished L.A. locations. Mulligan's film is a choice example of under-revered 1970's urban American cinema, torpid and dissolute.

Reportedly, Turner Movie Classics intends to schedule the Nickel Ride, which is not currently available on DVD.

The Pile

Excerpts from my journal:

Monday: I tried to ignore the pile. But as I drove by, the pile pleaded: "Adam, save us, re-use us, the remnants of great woodworking lies amongst us".

Tuesday: I pretended not to look as I accelerated past. Still, whispered aloud, "I can't, my garage is filled and I've filled the garages of close friends."



Wednesday: Tried to forget pile, remembered my twelve step plan.

Thursday: Took alternate route, knowing better than to tempt fate.

Friday: Late afternoon, grew curious. Pile resumed sirenous call, "we won't lie here forever you know, this might be your last chance."

Saturday: Issued stern declaration, "I can't save everything, so unless there's cast iron or porcelain amongst you--I mustn't. This sort of thing has damaged my relationships. No mas!"

Sunday: Pile responded, "we've unpainted workwork and attractive brass hardware."

Monday: I wrested cabinet doors from pile and two inch-and-a-quarter thick pieces of douglass fir.



Tuesday: Another pile appeared.

Sports Arena Memories

A continuing series devoted to the unappreciated, increasingly vulnerable Los Angeles Sports Arena.

One of my most satisfying seasons as a sports fan was the Los Angeles Clippers 1996-97 campaign. The Clippers, picked for cellar dwellers in pre-season, eked into the playoffs, galvanized by unsung power forward Loy Vaught, guard Malik Sealy, and the strong post-up play of combo forward Rodney Rogers.




Astonishingly, the team won late season games against playoff aspirants Sacramento (still the last time the franchise has won in Sacramento) and Golden State, behind hard-driving veteran coach Bill Fitch, to secure the West's 8th playoff seed.

Unsurprisingly, the Clippers were swept in the post-season's first round by the Western Conference's number one seed the Utah Jazz, including a 92-104 home loss (the last post-season basketball game played in the Sports Arena).




Five members of that Clippers team are still active: the ageless Bo Outlaw (Orlando), fresh-faced Brent Barry (San Antonio), UCLA's Darrick Martin (Toronto), Lorenzen Wright (Atlanta), and Eric Piatkowski, the Polish Rifle (Phoenix).

The Clippers played only two more seasons in the Sports Arena, none of which were as accomplished, before moving into the titantic, fan-unfriendly Staples Center.

Front Yard Tents

A poor man's arbor, a porte-cochere for the less fortunate, or just another unsightly garden accoutrement?



Want shade? Plant a tree, or use your front porch for crimineysakes. Need protection for your car? Put it in a garage, a back-yard car port, or under a car cover.




This tent is decorated with Christmas lights, a tactless and insulting declaration of status and permanency. After all, would you ring lights around a front porch umbrella stand, spotlight your composting chamber, or dress your sprinklers with flowery tassels?






Gosh, what ugly neighborhood-degrading thing can I put in my front yard?

How about a weight set? It'd be nice to lift beneath the clean-smelling Eucalyptus trees. Who cares if the cast iron plates and silvery Olympic bar collect bird droppings and become streaked in a coppery rust color.

I could set up an outdoor workshop, with large power tools fixed to a concrete base. Plentiful light, easy access, and a shady north side would make me the envy of many a woodworker. Furthermore, think of the public service: the late afternoon breezes would blow mulch-enhancing saw dust into many a neighboring yard, improving azelea and camelia blooms.

But really, who cares about others?

Left Over Material #1

With the arrival of 2007, I've begun cleaning out the RecenteringElPueblo edit files, loaded with abandoned writings, unaccompanied photos, and unrealized ditties.





I had hoped to write a piece comparing real estate agents to forcados (a group of eight who seek, without weapons or props, to engage, surround and stymie the bull). I took digital stills at a bullfight at the Portuguese Community Center in Artesia. I can't at all remember the point, nor do I think it was clever.




I may have also became uncomfortable with the comparison after one of the curanderos (the second in line), was knocked unconscious, trampled, and taken by stretcher to a local hospital.



Still, it'd be a shame not to use the snaps, eh?