Citizen Jane
As a child in London, Jane Goodall carried a torch for Tarzan and dreamed of becoming a female Dr. Doolittle, so it’s fitting that another children’s adventure story – Dr. Seuss’ Oh, The Places You’ll Go! – will provide the theme for this year’s Rose Parade, starring Dr. Goodall as Grand Marshal. The world’s most... More
Bag Lady
How do you make simple things interesting and chic? This is the question bag designer Clare Vivier asks herself each time she sits down to create a new piece, and it has guided the evolution of her line since she first fashioned her own leather laptop case, finding no stylish options available. Since launching in... More
Desert By Design
Some architects want their work to be admired; John Lautner wanted his to be experienced. “He designed from the inside out,” says interior designer and hotelier Tracy Beckmann. “He wanted you to feel.” Beckmann and her partner Ryan Trowbridge opened the Hotel Lautner, a small boutique property in Desert Hot Springs, last September after a... More
Food For Thought
Steve Rudicel grew up at the historic Zane Grey Estate, a rambling 18,000 square foot Mediterranean-style mansion in Altadena, the former home of the famed Western novelist. When his father died in 2004, Rudicel, a restaurateur who owns The Press in Pomona, and his girlfriend Gloria Putnam, a trained physicist who works for Kodak, moved... More
This Side of Paradise
A secluded hillside haven just above Sunset Boulevard, Bel Air is one of the world’s most prestigious – and private – communities. It’s a place populated by movie moguls and former presidents, where property values only go up, never down. Like its namesake, the iconic Hotel Bel-Air also wears its luster more discreetly than its... More
Space Invader
For the L.A.-based painter and installation artist Sarah Cain, space is more than just physical; it’s also psychic and emotional. “I try to morph the three,” says Cain, whose site-specific works incorporate existing elements like wind and light and dip into a playfully vivid palette that defies her contemplative nature. Cain developed her style creating... More
Shareen Mitchell’s Rags to Riches Tale
Anyone who has set foot in Shareen Vintage, a vast downtown warehouse space lined with endless racks of sparkly cocktail frocks, gauzy, ankle-grazing hippie robes and everything in between, will hardly be surprised to learn that the shop’s owner, Shareen Mitchell, is starring in a new reality show, “Dresscue Me,” premiering Tuesday on Discovery’s Planet... More
Just Don’t Call Them Communes
Today we’ve got reality TV stars and struggling actors in superhero costumes, but in the early ‘70s even stranger, more exotic creatures roamed the boulevards of Hollywood: the 100+ members of The Source Family, a spiritual commune led by a man named Father Yod, that made its home in a mansion in the Hills. Dressed... More
Fruit Force
On a breezy Sunday afternoon, families, artists and gardeners roam the grounds at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, where a different sort of art has cropped up altogether: A potato field grows between two buildings; ailing strawberries are nourished through an elaborate system of IV bags near the main entrance; and a soil-... More
“Electric Car” Director Greens Events
“The greenest event is no event at all; just everybody stay at home,” says “Who Killed the Electric Car?” director Chris Paine. “But,” he adds, “I’m not a purist like that.” Paine, in fact, is a regular fixture on Hollywood’s green social scene, often pulling up to premieres and parties in his show-stopping Tesla, but... More
Arts & Architecture Redux
Its pages may espouse the principles of modernism and minimalism, but in its presentation, Taschen’s Arts & Architecture, the Complete Reprint 1945-67, is as maximal as it gets – in the publisher’s standard fashion. After distilling seven decades of the Italian design journal Domus into 12 hardbound volumes, Taschen took a different approach with A&A,... More
The Om Factor
There may be 2,500 square feet of Ray Kappe-designed sleekness in Steve Glenn’s Santa Monica home, but just before festivities started on a fall evening, the chief executive of eco-friendly developer LivingHomes was still worrying about where to put his guests . . . and their yoga mats. This was the third time Glenn had... More