Modern Architecture in LA

WHEN people think about LA urbanism, they still invoke the same old cliches -- Woody Allen's line about the only "cultural advantage" being a right turn on red, the notorious "sprawl," and so on. They recite Getrude Stein's line about "no there there" (applied originally to another California city) as if the early town fathers just sort of forgot that part.

So it was refreshing to hear from two Getty curators, who I spoke to last week about the place's new architecture initiative, that the sins and glories of LA were all pretty much planned out a century ago.

(I got very pumped up talking these guys about our bold, unconventional metropolis -- and then as I got on the 405, realized what an absolute disaster LA can be sometimes.) 

Here is my LA Times piece on the Getty's Pacific Standard Time Presents: Modern Architecture, and the inaugural show, Overdrive. (There will be a lot in the press on this over the next few months.) It is a sequel of sorts to its (much larger) initiative on postwar art in L.A.

The first press conference was at the Capitol Records tower, and the Getty seems to be rolling this out in style. What I wonder is, with all the work done on LA modernism -- by everyone from the Conservancy's Modern Committee to DnA radio host Frances Anderson to architectural historian Alan Hess -- can the Getty, which spent years basically ignoring LA and contemporary culture, add anything to the continuing story?

Looking forward to finding the answer to that question over the ensuing weeks and months.

California Vs. The Great Plains

The writer and urbanist Joel Kotkin has a fascinating piece in a recent Newsweek called "The Great Great Plains," which looks at the way cities like Fargo and Bismarck -- as well as most of Texas -- are booming while much of the rest of the country languishes in a dead economy.

It got us here at the Misread City wondering: What are Omaha and Dallas doing right that Los Angeles and other West Coast cities are doing wrong? And why can't the great state of California keep up with... North Dakota?

I'm a longtime admirer of the work of Kotkin, whose latest book is The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050. I spoke to him for a New York Times piece about bohemia and the recession, and while I suspect his politics and mine are not always congruent, he's a formidable thinker and reporter. We're happy to have him in a Misread City Q+A.

So in brief, why do the cities of the plains seem to be doing so well?

Basically these cities benefit from being in the heart of the commodity economy that benefits from growing demand from China and India, which are currently the engines of the U.S. economy. They also have good schools, are affordable and reasonably pro business.

Meanwhile, West Coast cities, especially LA, remain in the toilet economically. Given all the dynamism here, Why?

California is committing suicide, at least economically. The extreme 'green' policies are just the latest blow after a series of tax and regulatory burdens that are forcing business to expand elsewhere. We still have some key headquarters - more in north than south - and amazing skills, but the flow is almost all the wrong way. In LA specifically there seems to have been little economic strategy except the notion of green jobs, which is largely hype and every other community is going after. So we end up with solar plants in Arizona manufactured outside the state so we can pay for ever more expensive energy...

The key is that the city council in particular, along with the Mayor, have no notion of how economies work, although they may be writing the book (unconsciously of course) on how to make one not work.

This is not just a tax and regulatory issue. Other places with similar burdens - Boston, NY, Seattle - are not booming but doing better. If it wasn't for Detroit we'd be the big city basket case in the country

How much do California’s woes have to do with the tax-revolt measure Prop. 13?

Prop 13 had several bad effects. First, it centralized decision-making in Sacramento, never a good idea, since it took away property tax revenues. Second, it shifted taxes too much to income, which hurt entrepreneurs, the middle class and investors. It also made the state more liable to wild swings in stock and housing markets. Third, it became an excuse for people, largely on the left, to ignore the larger problems of over-regulation and hostility to business.

Prop 13 went too far and should have been restricted only to residences, with a cap at some level. But as someone who covered it at the time, the establishment (that's including most business) did not have the will to reform a system that was driving people out of their homes.

In other words, lots of blame to go around.

How much longer do you expect West Coast cities will be ailing, and what will it do to our urbanism, our neighborhoods and sense of civic connection?

 

I am not sure you can put all the western cities in one context. Seattle and Portland have much smaller working class, minority populations and more access to clean energy (hydro mostly). They should transition a bit earlier given their own anti-business instincts.

The Bay Area has a leg up with Silicon Valley and has a more affluent population. San Diego and Orange also have problems but also not as many poor people or workers in distressed industries as LA or the Inland Empire. They will lag US but not as much as LA.

LA has the most diverse economy but needs to keep its traditional linchpins (manufacturing, trade and entertainment) going. Right now hard to see how this happens until there is a major political change.

Eric Owen Moss Vs. Los Angeles

For decades now, eric owen moss has been one of the most innovative, influential and feared architects in the southland. he's designed striking postmodern buildings in culver city and environs, taken the helm at SCI-Arc, and become what colleague thom mayne calls "a gladiator" in his appearances at various panels and reviews.

HERE is my LAT piece on moss and his latest work. the story comes from several conversations with a man whose speaking style i'd call one part free association, one part surrealist poetry, one part yogi berra.

besides his latest projects -- one of which, the gateway art tower, will be completed shortly -- moss was interested in discussing how LA can now lead the world in urbanism (planning, urban design, infrastructure reform, etc.) the same way it led the world in cutting edge architecture in the '80s and '90s.

moss will surely be in the news in the near future because of his controversial plan for a high-rise apartment complex near the beach in venice -- many neighbors are frustrated with the project and this will likely not go smoothly... until then he is very busy, despite the slumping economy, with projects, here and in asia.

Photo credit: Eric Owen Moss Architects

Eagle Rock and Bourgeois Bohemia Imperiled

ON a crisp winter day, with snow glinting on the san gabriel mountains, air cleansed by a recent rain, and mighty oak trees looming over the quiet streets above colorado blvd, eagle rock can seem like the kind of place '60s bands used to write songs about. but these days, people aren't singing -- or if they are, it's in a bittersweet key.

over the last few years northeast LA has become a kind of socal brooklyn, with craftsmans and palm trees instead of  brownstones and maples. but things are slowing here as they are everywhere else. HERE is my new york times story on this neighborhood and how it may or may not survive the recession. (and here is a brief piece from the LAT written for the 2007 opening of larkin's, a new-wave soul food joint.)

i only regret that the tight pages of a newspaper means i didnt have room to mention by name some of the places that give ER its identity -- whether old (casa bianca pizza) or new (colorado wine company, auntie em's bakery/cafe, vegeterian restaurant fatty's, cool bar the chalet.)

my story suggests that this and other neighborhoods will suffer with the economic downturn -- this is a case where i am entirely happy to be wrong.

tonight, by coincidence, is what i hope is not the last-stand of hipster culture in eagle rock: the elusive kogi korean/taco truck is parking outside colorado wine co. to accompany a massively sold out tasting.

it looks like ABC news may be following the story as part of a larger package about the awful california economy.

what do my distinguished readers expect will happen to this and other on-the-verge eastside LA neighborhoods?

Photo credit: Flickr user 30 and Colorado Wine Company