After Corbu

Light posting of late, as I’m working on a different online project that I’m quite excited about. When it’s of at least beta quality you’ll hear me chattering about it endlessly, but until then…your moment of zen phallacy:

La Live by Gensler
It’s not often you see a building get larger as it goes up. […]

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The impressive facade stylings of Thom Faulders:

Airspace Tokyo
I like looking at architecture models, but check out the designers’ website above for the as-built version. This skin was developed for a new building, but what’s most exciting is its potential uses on existing structures. In LA, we love us some low-rise stucco box apartments, […]

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I’m a big fan of scalable architecture — go ahead and throw ladders, spiral stairs, fireman poles, terraces, monkey bars, ropes, balconies, slides, whatever up your buildings (like La Meme!). It ‘tames’ steep vertical rises making them comprehensible to users and passer-bys….and it’s just fun for getting inside to involve Rube Goldberg like complexity.
Apparently, […]

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Crazy shit from 2006 from my wife’s research into racism in LA housing:
I am 34, married with 2 kids and have accepted a new job in Los Angeles. I’d like to live in a White suburb, do you have any recommendations?
Oh no he didn’t!  And then:
I turned down the job.
After seeing those Mexicans […]

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Also: Hollywood Forever is, unsurprisingly, a prime grave hunting (not to be confused with grave digging) spot, and the Hollywood Underground website can give you directions to various famous remains.  Note that, in general, I don’t understand the appeal of looking at a piece of marble that has  a famous guitarist under it, but the […]

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Photo by Xispas. Thanks!
Today is the awesome Dias de los Muertos at Hollywood Forever Cemetery,and if you’re in LA, you really should go. Families line the pathways with altars to dead loved ones packed with pictures, favorite foodstuffs, stuffed animals, etc. (It’s something of a mindfuck regarding the ways we’re remembered after we’re […]

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From the people that brought you the Rodney King Experience….the LAPD Blog!  It combines reporting on the best in crime from around Los Angeles with recruiting. Of course, the latter bit might work better if it was juxtaposed with officer shooting reports.
It’s actually a kind of depressing read; I don’t recommend it.

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From the Bad Futurist Pantheon: The End of Tall Buildings
Not that they don’t make a convincing case, but if anything we have entered an accelerated period of tower construction since 9/11. Even in LA, home of the earthquake, we’re racing up as fast as we can. An example of the wonderful city of […]

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This comes from an anonymously witness too lazy to find a bigger blog:
Tom Labonge, my LA city council member and sometime “Mayor of Griffith Park” threatened to close down Griffith Observatory earlier today during a somewhat violent confrontation with observatory staff.
The conflict started when Labonge brought a child cancer victim and their family to the […]

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Photo by Vincent Cobb. Thanks!
What happens when you combine the evil of plastic bags with the evil of union-busting? No sun. So:

Play Nice.

Use No More Plastic Bags; Go Reusable instead.

Read this LAist Rant. Particularly this part:
“I always had them in my car trunk with good intentions. Though, for years, I would forget […]

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Salto Mortale with Santa Ana explanations that wax poetic.

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I have been to Disneyland three times.
First, as a child, an experience I do not remember. I am told I sat down in the parking lot and declared I was going to die if I had to walk any farther. My hatred for parking lots started early.
Second, as a teenager to participate in […]

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The LA tribute at BLDGBLOG doesn’t quite hit all the reasons I love the city — I’m also very much enamored of the various efforts to create a livable world in the belly of the capitalist beast, and I give that it’s own category — but it comes close.  An excerpt:
I mean that Los Angeles […]

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It’s on fire again today, and while I hope everyone got out safely, it seems like a good time to remember: The Case for Letting Malibu Burn.

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The International Dark-Sky Association (warning: garish site design) defines light pollution as:
Any adverse effect of artificial light, including sky glow, glare, light trespass, light clutter, decreased visibility at night, and energy waste.
I first heard about these guys when a commenter in Architectural Record complained that a picture caption that lauded a building for “lighting up […]

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I’m turning out all my lights for an hour as part of a Lights Out LA energy conservation project.  This is a big sacrifice for me, because I’m afraid of the dark.  And I don’t really believe in individual action to fix structural social ills.  But I’m feeling generous tonight (and I need to balance […]

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