FINE LIVING IN THE GREATER PASADENA AREA
May 2015
DESIGN PASADENA
2015
RECREATING THE PAST At Showcase House
DESIGNING THE FUTURE On The Spanish Coast
MARCEL DUCHAMP In Pasadena
REGINALD JOHNSON’S Uncommon U ncommon TTouch ouch
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A R C H I T E CT U R E . C O N S T R U CT I O N . I N T E R I O R S . 626.486.0510
HartmanBaldwin.com
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VOLUME 11 | NUMBER 5 | MAY 2015
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PHOTOS (top): Tommy Ewasko, (bottom left): Courtesy of Julian Wasser and Craig Krull Gallery, Santa Monica
DESIGN PASADENA 2015 11 COMMON AND UNCOMMON Early 20th-century Pasadena architect Reginald Johnson designed for both the common man and the elite —By Michael Cervin
16 THE 2015 SHOWCASE HOUSE OF DESIGN Where everything new is old again —By Bettijane Levine, Photos by Tommy Ewasko
35 MARCEL DUCHAMP IN PASADENA The Pasadena Art Museum’s 1963 retrospective of the iconoclast’s work brought both the underappreciated artist and museum onto center stage. —By William Hackman
39 ART CENTER’S EXPERIMENTAL FRAME IN SPAIN Students devised and built a sustainable igloo-shaped pavilion on the Costa Brava. —By Morris Newman
DEPARTMENTS 10
FESTIVITIES L.A. Children’s Chorus gala and setting a world record with the Blue Ribbon
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KITCHEN CONFESSIONS If it’s spring, it must be rhubarb-streusel season.
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THE LIST Eclectic music and art in South Pas, Fiesta of the Spanish Horse, Castle Green opens its doors and more
ABOUT THE COVER: Photo by Alexander Vertikoff, courtesy of HartmanBaldwin Design/Build 05.15 ARROYO | 7
EDITOR’S NOTE Designers have become expert at harmonizing historical styles with modern living. Cramped kitchens that were once the province of servants have morphed into open spaces housing the family’s heart and hearth, yet the designs and materials used can be traced directly to a vintage home’s origin — even if their actual age is a mirage. Indeed, for this year’s Pasadena Showcase House of Design, which runs through May 17, a number of designers didn’t merely preserve the surviving artistry of architect Fernand Parmentier’s English Tudor–Craftsman hybrid home built in 1910. They introduced new touches inspired by the past, a design paradox that’s particularly at home in historic preservation–minded Pasadena. Editor-at-large Bettijane Levine and contributing photographer Tommy Ewasko take you inside the Showcase House, now in its 51st year. Michael Cervin introduces you to another side of Pasadena’s rich architectural past — the buildings of Reginald D. Johnson, which spanned estates for the elite, public buildings and affordable housing. As Pasadena-based designer Jennifer Bevan, who took on the remodel of a 1927 manse Johnson conceived for his Episcopal-bishop father, told Cervin, “Houses like Johnson’s keep the Arroyo sought after.” Looking to Pasadena’s more recent past, William Hackman, a former managing editor at the J. Paul Getty Trust, writes about the delightful brouhaha created by Marcel Duchamp’s visit here for his landmark 1963 retrospective at the former Pasadena Art Museum. The piece is an excerpt from Hackman’s intriguing new book, Out of Sight: The Los Angeles Arts Scene of the Sixties (Other Press). Finally, Morris Newman offers a glimpse of the future in his story about an Art Center College of Design student project on Spain’s Costa Brava. The igloo-shaped pavilion inspired by pine cones was the result of students fusing two apparent opposites — spirituality and technology. —Irene Lacher
EDITOR IN CHIEF Irene Lacher ART DIRECTOR Carla Cortez ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Stephanie Torres PRODUCTION DESIGNERS Tim Oliver, Rochelle Bassarear EDITOR-AT-LARGE Bettijane Levine COPY EDITOR John Seeley CONTRIBUTORS Leslie Bilderback, Martin Booe, Michael Cervin, Scarlet Cheng, Carole Dixon, Lisa Dupuy, Lynne Heffley, Tariq Kamal, Kathleen Kelleher, Rebecca Kuzins, Brenda Rees, John Sollenberger, Nancy Spiller ADVERTISING DIRECTOR Dina Stegon ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES Lisa Chase, Brenda Clarke, Leslie Lamm ADVERTORIAL CONTRIBUTING EDITOR Bruce Haring ADVERTISING DESIGNERS Tim Oliver, Stephanie Torres HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGER Andrea Baker PAYROLL Linda Lam ACCOUNTING Alysia Chavez, Kacie Cobian OFFICE ASSISTANT Ann Weathersbee PUBLISHER Jon Guynn 8 | ARROYO | 05.15
arroyo FINE LIVING IN THE GREATER PASADENA AREA
SOUTHLAND PUBLISHING V.P. OF FINANCE Michael Nagami V.P. OF OPERATIONS David Comden PRESIDENT Bruce Bolkin CONTACT US ADVERTISING dinas@pasadenaweekly.com EDITORIAL editor@arroyomonthly.com PHONE (626) 584-1500 FAX (626) 795-0149 MAILING ADDRESS 50 S. De Lacey Ave., Ste. 200, Pasadena, CA 91105 ArroyoMonthly.com ©2015 Southland Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.
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Robert Lopez, Richard Sherman, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Edward Nowak, John Lasseter and Leonard Maltin
LACC’s Young Men’s Ensemble
Pasadena’s Los Angeles Children’s Chorus honored Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, the married songwriters behind Disney’s animated mega-hit Frozen, at its annual Gala Bel Canto on April 14. So the Oscar- and Grammy-winning team returned the favor. “Music, and particularly choral singing, is one-stop shopping for a happy meaningful life,” Anderson-Lopez told LACC parents and supporters at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in downtown Event Chair Cheryl Scheidemantle, Executive Director Deb Lewis, Artistic Director Anne Tomlinson and board Chair Jennifer Terry
L.A. Also honored was La Cañada Flintridge’s Edward J. Nowak, LACC’s president and vice chair and deputy general counsel of The Walt Disney Co. The event raised
Nowak with Mary Poppins songwriter Sherman
$257,000 for the acclaimed children’s chorus...More than 2,500 fi fth-graders set a Guinness World Record on the Music Center Plaza April 9 for the largest-ever ribbon dance at the 45th annual Blue Ribbon Children’s Festival, hosted by the Music Center’s women’s support group... The Fire Family Foundation hosted the Challenge for Dylan, a competition for SoCal’s strongest firefighter, on March 14 at Pasadena’s Title Boxing Club as a fundraiser for Dylan Wolfe, a 2-yearBlue Ribbon President Carla Sands and Guiness World Records Adjudicator Philip Robertson
Blue Ribbon Children’s festival
old boy fighting brain cancer.
Lisa Derderian, Pasadena Mayor Bill Bogaard, L.A. County Fire Chief Daryl L. Osby and Pasadena Fire Chief Bertral Washington
Avery Barth, Valerie Hoffman and Peggy Collins Washington flanked by Pasadena firefighter-boxers
Crowds on the Music Center Plaza 10 | ARROYO | 05.15
(Front row) Dylan and Katie Wolfe, (Back row) Cheri and Chief Bertral Washington
Duelling (and smiling) Fire Chiefs Osby and Washington
PHOTOS: Lee Salem for Los Angeles Children’s Chorus Gala Bel Canto, Ryan Miller/Capture Imaging for Blue Ribbon Children’s Festival Brenda Rees and Jamie Nicholson for the Boxing for Dylan event
FESTIVITIES
COMMON AND UNCOMMON Noted Pasadena architect Reginald Johnson’s work spanned estates for the elite, public buildings and affordable housing.
PHOTOS: vintage photos courtesy of the Archives Pasadena Museum of History; main photo: Jeffrey Ong
BY MICHAEL CERVIN
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FAMILY VALUES: (background) Johnson’s home for his father included a light-filled sunroom opening onto the back terrace; (left inset) the terrace was designed for outdoor dining and lounging; (top right inset) the grounds feature sculpted shrubbery and a pool accented with a classical urn motif; (bottom right inset) the foyer combines formal and rustic styles.
–continued from page 11
Colonial, birthed in California under Mexican rule and characterized by two stories, each with wraparound porches, and a hip roof that slopes down to adobe walls. The Lombardy Road residence, last sold in 2003 for $2.85 million, underwent a $1 million renovation last year in which it was expanded and modernized. Shaded by trees scattered throughout half an acre, the 6,830-square-foot, six-bedroom, seven-bathroom residence has a chef ’s kitchen that opens to the great room, an adjacent dining room for large-scale entertaining, a grand formal living room, an upstairs-and-downstairs master suite, four fireplaces, a 636-square-foot pool and more. Pasadena-based Jennifer Bevan of Jennifer Bevan Interiors, who took on the remodel, expresses what every designer faces when presented with a historic residence. “My challenges included kitchens that were very small, since only the help used them, and those have to be expanded for 21st-century living as families congregate there, not to mention proper master bathrooms and closets,” she says. Reworking those spaces required her to maintain the original footprint. “You want to keep the integrity of the home matching — the same trim, crown moldings and proportions — in achieving a remodel that is seamless,” she continues. “If someone is familiar with great architecture like Reginald Johnson’s, they usually want to uphold the integrity of the house. Houses like Johnson’s keep the Arroyo sought after.” Johnson was born in Westchester, New York, in July 1882, the only son of Joseph and Isabel Johnson. It seems clear that through his work, Johnson embraced the religious beliefs his Episcopal-bishop father espoused — the commonality of man, tolerance and –continued on page 14
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PHOTOS: Jeffrey Ong
E
arly-20th-century architect Reginald Davis Johnson designed a great many private residences for the wealthy and elite of his day, but a small house he designed at 1207 S. Pasadena Ave. for businessman John McWilliams reflects the kind of connection he had with the common man. Johnson designed the house his daughter Julia Child grew up in. Better known and more impressive is a mansion near Caltech currently on the market for $4.95 million. It’s a 1927 Monterey Colonial–style estate Johnson designed and built as a home for his eminent father, the Rev. Joseph Horsfall Johnson, the first bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. The bishop helped found Wilshire Boulevard’s Good Samaritan Hospital, whose nurses’ residence and Beaux-Arts–style hospital building were also designed by his son in the 1920s. Reginald Johnson had a career that spanned one of the most transformational periods in American architectural history. During two world wars and the Great Depression, Johnson’s buildings helped define a style of architecture that became internationally renowned for its distinctive regional character. “Reginald Johnson has been one of Southern California’s foremost residence architects and has been a pioneer in the development of a style which would be a portrayal of simplified domestic charm and also be reminiscent of early life in California,” Architect and Engineer magazine wrote in April 1929. “His work is characterized by large openings, beautifully proportioned, and clear detail of a straightforward and scholarly style.” Thus Johnson helped birth the Spanish Colonial Revival ideal now prevalent throughout the Southland. For his father, Johnson chose a different indigenous architectural style — Monterey
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ON THE MOVE: The Orange Grove Boulevard home Johnson designed for wealthy rancher Charles Paxton was later saved from the wrecking ball and relocated to South Pasadena.
respect for all peoples. He earned a B.A. from Williams College in 1907; then, like many students at the time, he studied architecture in Paris, before attending M.I.T., from which he graduated in 1910 with a degree in architecture. Johnson received collegiate office training in Pasadena in the offices of Myron Hunt, Elmer Grey and Robert Farquhar, all of whom have left their design stamp on Arroyoland in their own right. In 1912, he began practicing architecture in Pasadena, where he went on to hire a thenunknown and untested black architect named Paul Williams. “Reginald urged him to study architectural engineering,” says Leslie Luebbers, director of the Paul Williams Project and executive director of the Art Museum of the University of Memphis. Williams went on to become the nation’s most prominent African-American architect of the era. As early as 1915, Johnson began to abandon the Victorian and Craftsman designs then in vogue and became one of the first advocates for Mediterranean houses, which became popular in Pasadena. His more notable projects include Pasadena’s Hale Solar Laboratory, Santa Barbara’s Post Office and Biltmore Hotel and the Cathedral Center of St. Paul (which his father consecrated as bishop). Johnson made a good living designing palatial estates for the privileged in Montecito and Pasadena, but he also designed affordable housing, a cause that became even more important to him in his later years. In 1939, Johnson designed the Rancho San Pedro public housing project for the City of Los Angeles. Throughout the 1930s he worked on Baldwin Hills Village, which he designed as a state-of-the-art affordable housing complex. The 64-acre condominium community known as Village Green, declared a National Historic Landmark in 2001, features 629 units of one-, two- and three-bedroom homes; the community still thrives today, fulfilling its intended purpose of providing affordable housing with an emphasis on communal space. Johnson also co-founded the Los Angeles Citizens Housing Council, which lobbied for low-income housing programs, and served as chief architect for L.A.’s public housing projects. Johnson’s prestige stems from his ability to harmonize historic Spanish design with Mediterranean and traditional Anglo-Saxon motifs, resulting in an easy congruence 14 | ARROYO | 05.15
between his buildings and their surrounding topography, thus helping create a new style of design — Spanish Colonial Revival. This idea is seen clearly in one of his epic properties, Rancho San Carlos in Montecito, currently on the market for $125 million. Working with the estate’s natural slope and contours, he astutely sited the home on two natural terraces. By planning the formal living rooms around a central courtyard and placing the master and family bedroom wings on the upper terrace, he effectively created a spatial separation that afforded privacy, serenity and exceptional views. Also of note was an eclectic Spanish-Mediterranean estate on South Orange Grove Boulevard commissioned in 1919 by Charles Paxton, a wealthy citrus and cattle farmer. The following year, Johnson’s design, which also incorporated English-style elements, was declared one of L.A. County’s 10 most notable examples of architecture by the Southern California chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA); in 1921 it received the AIA’s top prize for residential architecture. Despite its awards, the 7,000-square-foot villa was slated to be razed in the 1970s to make way for a new school athletic field, but a former occupant, interior designer Cheryl Fremdling, bought the property and moved it to South Pasadena. The Hillside Road estate, which features nine bedrooms and nine baths, was last sold in 2012 for $4.1 million. (Dorothy Korostoff of Deasy/Penner was the listing agent.) But it is Johnson’s work on Village Green and his determination to create plentiful inexpensive housing that is his enduring legacy. Sure, the Santa Barbara Biltmore lives on, but the importance of providing housing for the average Joe lies at the heart of Johnson’s work. What precipitated this shift Johnson never disclosed, though his 1953 obituary in Architectural Forum noted that he quit his practice in 1934 when he saw the squalid conditions of Washington, D.C.’s slums, and “...spent most of the rest of his life battling for public housing, slum clearance, urban rehabilitation, [becoming] a convert to contemporary design.” His Pasadena-born son Joseph Leupp Johnson also became a notable architect in Southern California; his career included a late ’40s partnership with Gregory Ain, who had served as Charles and Ray Eames’ chief engineer during World War II. Reginald Johnson died in Pasadena at the age of 70. ||||
PHOTOS: Erik Grammer
–continued from page 12
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THE 2015 PASADENA SHOWCASE HOUSE OF DESIGN
Where everything new is old again BY BETTIJANE LEVINE | PHOTOS BY TOMMY EWASKO
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EVERY HOUSE TELLS A STORY. AND EVERY YEAR, THE PASADENA SHOWCASE HOUSE FOR DESIGN BENEFITING THE ARTS WRITES A NEW CHAPTER IN THE SAGA OF ARROYOLAND’S GREAT HISTORICAL ESTATES. THIS YEAR, IT’S THE ELIOT MANSION IN THE OAK KNOLL DISTRICT, BUILT IN 1910 BY FRENCH-BORN ARCHITECT FERNAND PARMENTIER FOR TYCOON JOHN V. ELIOT AS A GIFT FOR HIS BRIDE. THE ELIOTS MOVED OUT ABOUT FIVE YEARS LATER. PARMENTIER DIED IN 1915 AT 48 WHILE FIGHTING FOR FRANCE IN WORLD WAR I. THEIR NAMES MAY HAVE FADED FROM PROMINENCE, BUT THEIR 9,400-SQUARE-FOOT, ECLECTIC ENGLISH TUDOR HOUSE LIVES ON, A MONUMENT TO THE ERA WHEN SKILLED ARTISANS HANDCRAFTED MAHOGANY BEAMS, DECORATIVE PLASTER CEILINGS, GLAZED-TILE FIREPLACES, UPHOLSTERED WALLS AND ELEGANT MOLDINGS. THE GOAL OF INTERIOR DESIGNERS AT THIS YEAR’S SHOWCASE HOUSE WAS TO CREATE NEW DESIGNS FOR EACH ROOM THAT REMAIN TRUE TO THE HOME’S ORIGINAL CONCEPT AND HERITAGE. PERHAPS PARADOXICALLY, THESE STYLE FACELIFTS OFTEN INVOLVED INTRODUCING “NEW” HISTORICAL TOUCHES.
THE MASTER SUITE Joshua Cain of Highland Park’s Saxony Design Build has created a comfortable and charming master suite that combines true turn-of-the-century ambiance with 21st-century ease. Cain says that after stripping the 19-by-23-foot room bare, he found bits of original molding and recreated them throughout the room. He restored and refinished the original pine floors and rebuilt the original picture rail (which had been removed by previous owners) 8 feet above the floor, hanging all artwork from there. Walls are upholstered in Robert Allen woven tapestry fabric, which is paper-backed and applied like wallpaper. Furnishings are a mix of antiques and antique reproductions. The king-size four-poster bed is a copy of a British Colonial antique, reproduced by Susanne Hollis of South Pasadena. The bedside
stained-glass lamps from Meyda Tiffany are new designs that harken back to old ones. The bench at the bed’s foot is an Arts and Crafts antique; the recliner with flame-stitch Robert Allen fabric is Cain’s own Arts and Crafts antique. The floral-patterned wool rug, woven in Tibet, is from Tufenkian Artisan Carpets’ Arts and Crafts collection. Cain converted the room’s adjacent sun porch into a new master bath, using the old bathroom as a closet space. The custom marble-and-slate mosaic tile from Jeffrey Court is Cain’s design in a brown, cream and red pattern reminiscent of late 19th-century tile patterns. The oversize sinks are antique reproductions by St. Thomas Creations. Huge swivel mirrors are hung on pivots, and all lights are antique reproductions by Modern Lighting in Temple City. The volcanic-stone tub that retains heat is by Victoria + Albert. –continued on page 18 05.15 ARROYO | 17
–continued from page 17
THE WRITER’S ROOM San Marino interior designer Robert Frank has packed a ton of vintage style and storage space into a cozy, white-lacquered 10-by-12-foot room that doubles as an office and bedroom for a lucky guest. When Frank began, the room had only a bed, an engineered wood floor and dark red walls. Frank designed and J-Co. Cabinetry constructed a sleeping alcove that accommodates a twin mattress and built-in storage drawers below the bed. Frank added vintage appeal by installing tall white wainscoting around the room, topped by Phillip Jeffries’ pale blue grasscloth wallcovering. A pale seagrass floor, a white marble desk of Frank’s design and Calico’s white-linen upholstery combine with the breezy block print of the alcove curtains to make the room seem far more spacious than it is. But the sense of unity comes from the designer’s use of a classical circular-link motif in a white wood-relief pattern on the ceiling, echoed on all the room’s custom white cabinetry. –continued on page 20 18 | ARROYO | 05.15
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–continued from page 18
THE GRAND SALON Dona Dockendorf of Tocco Finale in San Marino says she designed the home’s grand salon (i.e., formal living room) “true to the 1910 period of the home.” She calls it “French Oriental, because in those days people with money traveled by ship to Europe and the Orient, and brought home all sorts of furniture and accessories from both continents, which they proudly mingled together as evidence of their journeys.” The salon is a cavernous 40-by26 square feet, with little natural light. “We needed to create a number of different seating arrangements to make the large space seem more intimate,” she says. The mahogany-beamed decorative plaster ceiling was original to the house, and Dockendorf restored the original mahogany color to the rest of the room’s wood. The pale cream, tan and mocha color scheme is spiked with bright tourmaline. Furniture and walls are all upholstered with opulent silk, silk-velvet and brocades by Beacon Hill Fabrics. Several sofas and chairs are from West Hollywood’s Ebanista, newly made but hand-carved and aged to look antique. The modern sofa, in creamy silk ottoman, is by Knoll. Walls are mocha paper-backed silk. Chandeliers with rock-crystal drops and wall sconces are from The World of Design in Cypress. The antique Coromandel wood folding screen is older than the house, Dockendorf says. |||| The 2015 Pasadena Showcase House of Design runs through May 17 and is closed Mondays. Children under 12 are not permitted. Hours, parking information and tickets, which cost $35–45, are available at pasadenashowcase.org or by calling (714) 442-3872. 20 | ARROYO | 05.15
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ARROYO
HOME & DESIGN SPECIAL ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT
WATER IS IN SHORT SUPPLY IN SOCAL Restrictions are underway to prevent a water crisis in the Southland BY BRUCE HARING
WE’VE GONE THROUGH DROUGHTS BEFORE IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. EVENTUALLY IT RAINS, AND EVERYONE GOES BACK TO USING WATER WITHOUT CARE. This time, though, we’re in a historically bad period. It’s so dry throughout the region that there’s real fears of running out of water. While it’s hard to believe that things are that dire when you can turn on a tap in your home and see pure water rushing out in seemingly unlimited supply, the concerns are real and growing. Since no one can predict when droughts will end, severe cutbacks are now going on in the Pasadena area and throughout the Southland to mitigate the potential water crisis. In mid-April, the State Water Resources Control Board issued a proposed mandate that several cities in the Pasadena area would have to reduce water use by as much as 35 percent. Arcadia, Glendora, La Habra, and Sierra Madre are among the cities most severely affected, but Alhambra, South San Gabriel, and Glendale will also have to reach cutbacks of 20 percent. The percentages are calculated based on a formula that uses previous gallons per person per day from last September. The State Water board will vote on implementing the cutbacks by early May and, if passed, would begin the actions in June, the start of the summer months that traditionally mark the heaviest use of water in our area. Those cities not meeting the water cutback standards face huge fines of as much as $10,000 per day, a heavy blow to tight municipal budgets. Officials have long been warning that we’re running out of water, but most of the messages seem to fall on deaf ears. To date, the state, residences and businesses have only cut back on water use by 11% from pre-summer 2014 highs. That’s far short of the hoped-for 20% reduction that was targeted by state officials, and led Governor Jerry Brown to issue an executive order in March that requires cities and towns to reduce water use by 25%. The state has recently experienced historically low snowpack, estimated at –continued on page 25 05.15 05.15 || ARROYO ARROYO || 23 23
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—ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT—
–continued from page 23
five percent of normal, with the driest January on record occurring this year. A senior water scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena predicted that California has only about a one-year supply of water left in reservoirs. In the San Gabriel Valley, year-to-date precipitation levels are at 54% of normal. PASADENA RESTRICTIONS
Pasadena has a spring/summer outdoor watering schedule in effect through October 31. Outdoor watering is restricted to three days per week (Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday). Customers are also required to adjust sprinkler timers to water before 9 a.m. or after 6 p.m. After Oct. 31, property owners can water one day per week through March 31. It’s part of the Level 1 Water Supply Shortage Plan now in effect. In addition to the restrictions on when you can water, the plan also calls for no watering during periods of rain; fixing water leaks within 72 hours; no excessive water flow into gutters or ditches from watering your landscape; no washing of paved surfaces except for safety or sanitation; and no washing vehicles except by using a handheld bucket or hose equipped with a water shutoff nozzle. In short, this time there’s no kidding around. But the good news is everyone can pitch in and help out so that the next step – actually turning off the water for certain hours – doesn’t have to happen. Aside from taking shorter showers, not washing the car at home, and letting your lawn go brown, there are other things the average person can do. One major step is installing a native landscape filled with drought-tolerant plants that don’t need a steady stream of water. LANDSCAPES AND RAIN BARRELS
Pasadena Water and Power is conducting free drought-tolerant landscape workshops that will provide in-depth information on converting high water-use lawns into drought tolerant landscapes. The half-day workshops, including one that starts on May 30, will teach the steps required, including how to remove grass, designing the landscape, choosing plants and landscape materials, proper plant installation, irrigation principles and options, and maintenance. There will also be an overview on rebates available and the various trees, shrubs, and flowering plants that work best without water. Pasadena Water and Power plans to hold the workshops monthly through September. Check the web site at http://www.cityofpasadena.net/waterandpower/workshops/ for updates. Conservation-minded area residents may also consider collecting and re-using rainwater from gutters and downspouts. By positioning storage barrels, you can capture the runoff from any rain event and then re-use it on lawns and gardens. This not only minimizes the amount of water lost to storm drains and sewer systems, but plants prefer rainwater because it is free of chlorine, fluoride –continued on page 28 05.15 | ARROYO | 25
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—ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT—
–continued from page 25
and other chemicals. You can have a maximum of four barrels per house, per the Pasadena Water and Power Dept., with rebates that start at $75 per barrel. The minimum size required is 50 gallons and the barrels should have a cover to prevent infiltration and breeding by mosquitos, rodents and outside debris. The rain barrel guidelines also require the barrel not block or restrict access to walkways or paths; must not be connected to an irrigation system; should be elevated six inches off the ground on a solid foundation; and strapped to –continued on page 30
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—ADVERTISING SUPPLEMENT—
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the home if the height of the barrel is two times greater than the width. More information is available at http://www.socalwatersmart.com/index.php/qualifyingproducts/rain-barrels There are other steps that can be taken by individuals and businesses. Pasadena Water and Power Dept. also advises that fountains and residential pool use be lessened, because evaporation causes excess water use. You should also keep showers under five minutes, turn off the faucet when brushing your teeth, and capture and re-use cold water that runs while you warm up your shower. You may also consider only running full loads of laundry and dishes and taking your car to a car wash that recycles its water. For more state tips and info on saving water, go to saveourwater.com Remember – these restrictions may be the “new normal” for the region, so it’s best to adapt now and help prevent even more severe restrictions. AMH&D
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arroyo
™
~HOME SALES INDEX~
ALTADENA Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. ARCADIA Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. EAGLE ROCK Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. GLENDALE Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. LA CAÑADA Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. PASADENA Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. SAN MARINO Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. SIERRA MADRE Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. SOUTH PASADENA Homes Sold Median Price Median Sq. Ft. TOTAL Homes Sold Avg Price/Sq. Ft.
MAR. ‘14 35 $565,000 1679 MAR. ‘14 44 $1,369,000 1456 MAR. ‘14 18 $605,550 1456 MAR. ‘14 115 $500,909 1443 MAR. ‘14 28 $1,440,000 2250 MAR. ‘14 147 $599,000 1410 MAR. ‘14 14 $2,339,500 2941 MAR. ‘14 10 $912,500 1573 MAR. ‘14 14 $912,500 1573 MAR. ‘14 425 $524
HOMES SOLD
+7.82%
2015
398
AVG. PRICE/SQ. FT.
2014
mar.
425
-6.35%
mar. HOMES SOLD
HOME SALES
MAR. ‘15 31 $668,000 1703 MAR. ‘15 34 $950,000 1714 MAR. ‘15 7 $635,000 1490 MAR. ‘15 111 $585,000 1490 MAR. ‘15 13 $1,800,000 2285 MAR. ‘15 162 $693,750 1470 MAR. ‘15 11 $2,280,000 2975 MAR. ‘15 7 $685,000 1468 MAR. ‘15 17 $865,000 1516 MAR. ‘15 398 $565
HOME SALES ABOVE RECENT HOME CLOSINGS IN THE PASADENA WEEKLY FOOTPRINT ADDRESS ALTADENA 1301 Rubio Street 1374 Hull Lane 3915 Old Toll Road 820 West Heritage Oak Court 1840 Skyview Drive 1854 Braeburn Road 126 East Loma Alta Drive 583 Cocopan Drive 2470 Windsor Avenue 2673 Raymond Avenue 1829 Pepper Drive ARCADIA 314 East Rodell Place 1354 Michillinda Avenue 2330 Louise Avenue 732 Pamela Circle 839 Pamela Place 1635 Perkins Drive 1114 South 6th Avenue 1228 North Baldwin Avenue 1016 East Camino Real Avenue 2016 Wilson Avenue 1530 South 1st Avenue 254 Angelo Place 140 West Foothill Boulevard 1801 North Santa Anita Avenue 306 East Wistaria Avenue 2109 South 3rd Avenue 1901 South 7th Place 148 Eldorado Street #B 251 East Colorado Boulevard 435 East Winnie Way 41 California Street #C EAGLE ROCK 5240 Dahlia Drive 2370 Las Colinas Avenue 5132 Hermosa Avenue 2528 Ridgeview Avenue 1132 Neola Street GLENDALE 747 West Kenneth Road 3720 San Fernando Road 3812 Brittany Lane 1924 Calle Dulce 2910 Edgewick Road 1851 Greenbriar Road 5220 Maryland Avenue 1830 Melwood Drive 1125 North Everett Street 1201 Moncado Drive 2201 El Arbolita Drive 1740 Del Valle Avenue 2948 Graceland Way 1651 Cumberland Terrace 1051 Eilinita Avenue 1120 Sweetbriar Drive 1551 Remah Vista Drive 1830 Rosita Drive 137 Franklin Court 1110 Avonoak Terrace 1172 Winchester Avenue 2703 East Glenoaks Boulevard 959 Calle Del Pacifico 421 La Loma Road 3705 La Crescenta Avenue 1659 Puebla Drive 1820 Fern Lane 3241 Sparr Boulevard 3520 Downing Avenue 1750 Golf Club Drive 1836 Calafia Street 5222 New York Avenue 816 East Mountain Street 1236 Ruberta Avenue 617 West Glenoaks Boulevard LA CAÑADA 348 Blythe Road 1313 Descanso Drive 4936 Alta Canyada Road 870 Green Lane
CLOSE DATE
PRICE
source: CalREsource
BDRMS.
SQ. FT.
YR. BUILT
PREV. PRICE
PREV. SOLD
03/31/15 03/23/15 03/06/15 03/13/15 03/06/15 03/27/15 03/03/15 03/26/15 03/04/15 03/26/15 03/17/15
$2,685,000 $1,417,500 $1,365,000 $1,350,000 $1,305,000 $965,000 $920,000 $908,000 $795,000 $780,000 $750,000
4 4 6 5 3 4 3 3 4 3 3
4350 2611 3881 3886 2822 2588 2904 1789 2874 1703 1715
1925 1931 1998 1998 1955 1926 1945 1958 2004 1939 1938
$265,000 $995,000 $1,050,000 $510,500 $938,000
09/15/1978 02/26/2014 06/30/2004 07/15/1998 03/27/2014
$860,000 $615,000 $619,500 $550,000
05/18/2012 09/04/2014 12/19/2012 09/29/2014
03/02/15 03/30/15 03/30/15 03/06/15 03/17/15 03/06/15 03/30/15 03/13/15 03/04/15 03/18/15 03/05/15 03/17/15 03/13/15 03/17/15 03/06/15 03/06/15 03/05/15 03/27/15 03/10/15 03/10/15 03/13/15
$2,560,000 $1,900,000 $1,833,000 $1,758,000 $1,751,000 $1,700,000 $1,650,000 $1,600,000 $1,560,000 $1,560,000 $1,288,000 $1,125,000 $1,088,000 $1,080,000 $1,060,000 $950,000 $880,000 $838,000 $800,000 $775,000 $750,000
4 4 4 4 5 4 3 4 0 4 3 4 3 3 3 3 2 2 4 3 2
5605 3273 2945 3870 4606 2047 2048 2582 0 3314 1721 2397 1735 1393 1707 1796 1532 1107 2120 1510 1630
2009 1954 2012 1989 2005 1948 1926 1953
$750,000
10/20/2008
$751,500 $549,000 $1,714,000 $1,400,000
04/07/2011 05/31/1995 07/09/2013 04/18/2014
$1,300,000 $750,000 $1,468,000 $248,000 $450,000 $800,000
11/06/2006 05/09/2012 07/25/2013 05/29/1987 12/01/1999 08/23/2006
$465,000 $310,000 $340,000 $780,000 $790,000 $145,000 $650,000
05/07/2003 11/24/1998 07/27/2001 02/27/2015 06/04/2014 05/03/1984 10/28/2010
03/13/15 03/23/15 03/17/15 03/25/15 03/06/15
$1,275,000 $1,137,500 $1,090,000 $890,000 $779,000
2 3 3 3 3
2230 2100 1730 1427 1936
1925 1909 1921 1927 1922
$175,000
01/11/1984
$785,000 $725,000 $179,091
05/09/2008 05/31/2006 03/26/1999
03/24/15 03/19/15 03/20/15 03/31/15 03/02/15 03/23/15 03/20/15 03/27/15 03/12/15 03/26/15 03/31/15 03/25/15 03/24/15 03/20/15 03/24/15 03/18/15 03/27/15 03/31/15 03/24/15 03/26/15 03/06/15 03/06/15 03/24/15 03/27/15 03/03/15 03/05/15 03/20/15 03/09/15 03/31/15 03/20/15 03/27/15 03/10/15 03/12/15 03/06/15 03/11/15
$2,200,000 $1,990,000 $1,455,000 $1,375,500 $1,220,000 $1,205,000 $1,185,000 $1,175,000 $1,101,500 $1,100,000 $1,100,000 $1,082,000 $1,065,000 $1,041,500 $1,040,000 $1,033,500 $1,000,000 $980,000 $950,000 $945,000 $915,000 $905,000 $890,000 $850,000 $834,000 $825,000 $825,000 $810,000 $806,500 $805,000 $800,000 $800,000 $799,000 $785,000 $765,000
5 3 4 4 3 5 4 4 3 3 2 2 2 3 3 4 3 4 4 5 5 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 3 2 3 3 3 4
3797 6736 3754 3539 3346 2977 2138 3051 2104 2742 2110 1193 2790 2429 1504 2944 2107 3237 2564 3194 2156 2256 2397 1740 1666 2210 1887 2134 1318 1216 1901 1686 2371 1802 2395
1946 1922 1993 1992 1997 1964 1965 1991 1928 1926 1971 1936 1926 1955 1951 1972 1964 1992 1913 1964 1923 1936 1989 1926 1941 1937 1961 1970 1937 1948 1956 1959 1936 1927 1936
$1,183,000 $905,000 $1,365,000 $90,000 $390,000 $711,000 $885,000 $787,500 $179,500 $775,000 $485,000
08/03/2006 03/01/2004 09/09/2005 01/19/1995 04/27/1995 02/06/2014 09/17/2003 08/19/2011 02/06/1987 03/25/2013 06/18/2003
$599,000 $425,000
05/07/2004 12/05/1997
$435,000 $790,000
07/28/1994 09/08/2004
$750,000
08/18/2008
$81,000 $370,000 $1,042,000 $600,000 $790,000 $150,000
02/14/1978 01/11/2001 01/12/2007 10/22/2004 11/15/2013 07/10/2002
$765,500 $645,000 $605,000 $689,000
02/17/2006 11/03/2014 07/03/2014 06/03/2004
03/26/15 03/31/15 03/12/15 03/20/15
$4,500,000 $4,250,000 $3,850,000 $2,800,000
5 4 5 4
5125 3008 5097 3580
1923 1947 1927 1952
1961 1937 1959 1947 1953 1956 1955 1950 1925 1941 1954 2010
$2,379,091 04/09/2010 $2,675,000 09/11/2007 $1,650,000 04/28/1998 $2,349,000 04/12/2012 –continued on page 34
The Arroyo Home Sales Index is calculated from residential home sales in Pasadena and the surrounding communities of South Pasadena, San Marino, La Canada Flintridge, Eagle Rock, Glendale (including Montrose), Altadena, Sierra Madre and Arcadia. Individual home sales data provided by CalREsource. Arroyo Home Sales Index © Arroyo 2015. Complete home sales listings appear each week in Pasadena Weekly.
05.15 ARROYO | 33
HOME SALES ABOVE RECENT HOME CLOSINGS IN THE PASADENA WEEKLY FOOTPRINT –continued from page 33 ADDRESS CLOSE DATE LA CAÑADA 4820 Hillard Avenue 03/30/15 4443 Commonwealth Avenue 03/26/15 609 Houseman Street 03/06/15 952 Regent Park Drive 03/20/15 4400 Bel Aire Drive 03/20/15 4930 Revlon Drive 03/02/15 1033 Vista Del Valle Road 03/17/15 4824 Hill Street 03/04/15 827 La Porte Drive 03/02/15 PASADENA 1107 Arden Road 03/19/15 543 Woodward Boulevard 03/16/15 1160 Chateau Road 03/09/15 1419 Wellington Avenue 03/27/15 979 South El Molino Avenue 03/11/15 1780 Devon Road 03/03/15 657 Prospect Boulevard 03/09/15 6 Richland Place 03/16/15 2976 Lombardy Road 03/31/15 231 East Villa Street 03/27/15 541 South Oak Knoll Avenue 03/19/15 389 Linda Vista Avenue 03/13/15 1270 Wynn Road 03/31/15 3626 East California Boulevard 03/17/15 109 Harkness Avenue 03/18/15 1460 Rose Villa Street 03/31/15 200 South Orange Grove Blvd. #207 03/31/15 888 El Campo Drive 03/13/15 1592 Glen Oaks Boulevard 03/19/15 1440 Arroyo View Drive 03/06/15 1026 East Woodbury Road 03/06/15 684 South Oak Knoll Avenue 03/27/15 920 Granite Drive #308 03/09/15 2005 Paloma Street 03/04/15 1011 Hillside Terrace 03/04/15 1484 North Chester Avenue 03/13/15 347 West Bellevue Drive 03/20/15 1356 Linda Vista Avenue 03/27/15 436 El Encanto Drive 03/27/15 319 Arlington Drive 03/09/15 250 South De Lacey Ave. #208A 03/24/15 774 North Mentor Avenue 03/26/15 481 South Orange Grove Blvd. #2 03/24/15 2565 Lambert Drive 03/30/15 3554 Yorkshire Road 03/12/15 3932 Sycamore Street 03/16/15 2427 East Dudley Street 03/31/15 480 South Orange Grove Blvd. #16 03/06/15 920 Granite Drive #204 03/13/15 1102 Las Riendas Way 03/05/15 3595 Greenhill Road 03/25/15 1090 South Los Robles Avenue 03/26/15 1881 Pasadena Glen Road 03/27/15 741 South Michillinda Avenue 03/16/15 1890 North Arroyo Boulevard 03/04/15 141 South Hudson Avenue #103 03/27/15 3890 Cartwright Street 03/10/15 2763 Las Flores Drive 03/04/15 1125 North Holliston Avenue 03/03/15 776 South Orange Grove Blvd.#4 03/25/15 500 South Oak Knoll Avenue #37 03/05/15 457 South Marengo Avenue #5 03/31/15 2078 Rose Villa Street 03/23/15 3825 Edgeview Drive 03/31/15 764 North Wilson Avenue 03/27/15 742 Locust Street #302 03/12/15 1738 North Holliston Avenue 03/13/15 201 North Orange Grove Blvd. #520 03/25/15 1044 East Howard Street 03/19/15 625 South Oak Knoll Avenue 03/17/15 626 Palisade Street 03/25/15 3758 Mohawk Street 03/25/15 122 Arlington Drive 03/06/15 500 East Del Mar Boulevard #33 03/06/15 3167 East Green Street 03/11/15 101 North Wilson Avenue 03/17/15 1280 Sierra Madre Villa Avenue 03/13/15 611 Eldora Road 03/06/15 118 West Glenarm Street 03/13/15 464 North Summit Avenue 03/02/15 931 East Walnut Street #626 03/04/15 1387 Cheviotdale Drive 03/06/15 861 South Orange Grove Boulevard 03/24/15 SAN MARINO 1195 Shenandoah Road 03/11/15 1995 Lombardy Road 03/13/15 1541 Charlton Road 03/02/15 1045 Roanoke Road 03/11/15 2257 Homet Road 03/11/15 1852 West Drive 03/24/15 2230 Adair Street 03/05/15 714 Plymouth Road 03/16/15 820 Palomar Road 03/18/15 2245 South Los Robles Avenue 03/27/15 888 Sussex Road 03/31/15 SIERRA MADRE 79 West Orange Grove Avenue 03/20/15 55 Sierra Place 03/06/15 56 Suffolk Avenue 03/27/15 SOUTH PASADENA 1001 Buena Vista Street 03/20/15 2032 Pine Street 03/23/15 1535 Ramona Avenue 03/20/15 1115 Pine Street 03/05/15 5051 Collis Avenue 03/06/15 257 Grace Drive 03/04/15 1139 Foothill Street 03/10/15 1830 Hill Drive 03/17/15 1010 Milan Avenue 03/04/15 313 Camino Del Cielo 03/10/15 34 | ARROYO | 05.15
PRICE
source: CalREsource
BDRMS.
SQ. FT.
YR. BUILT
$2,706,000 $2,450,000 $1,800,000 $1,565,000 $1,550,000 $1,259,000 $1,250,000 $850,000 $820,000
4 3 2 3 4 3 3 3 2
4755 2285 1449 2232 2343 1560 2091 1386 1255
1951 1949 1941 1941 1940 1947 1966 1951 1947
$3,026,000 $2,930,000 $2,695,000 $2,500,000 $2,400,000 $2,395,000 $2,360,500 $2,050,000 $2,050,000 $1,950,000 $1,850,000 $1,792,000 $1,775,000 $1,555,000 $1,550,000 $1,548,000 $1,543,000 $1,500,000 $1,363,500 $1,350,000 $1,350,000 $1,330,000 $1,320,000 $1,300,000 $1,299,000 $1,255,000 $1,249,000 $1,245,000 $1,220,000 $1,200,000 $1,195,000 $1,150,000 $1,118,000 $1,060,000 $1,051,000 $1,050,000 $1,027,000 $1,010,000 $980,000 $980,000 $980,000 $965,000 $955,000 $940,000 $930,000 $900,000 $890,000 $888,000 $875,000 $874,000 $850,000 $850,000 $850,000 $850,000 $830,000 $828,000 $827,500 $815,000 $800,000 $800,000 $799,000 $799,000 $790,000 $785,000 $785,000 $780,000 $780,000 $775,000 $760,000 $755,000 $755,000 $750,000 $750,000
5 3 4 4 5 3 5 4 3 0 0 3 4 3 6 5 0 5 3 2 4 3 2 2 3 4 2 3 3 3 3 4 3 4 2 2 4 2 2 3 3 4 3 4 5 2 4 4 3 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 6 3 2 4 3 3 2 2 3 3 3 4 1 2 4
2927 1868 2803 3340 3168 1972 3300 3050 1867 546 4310 1983 3394 2377 2906 2605 0 5443 2780 2517 2673 4044 1860 1465 2107 2524 1853 1881 1938 2138 1870 1761 2084 2457 1590 805 2500 2080 1860 2131 2356 1897 2596 2416 2731 2005 1776 2862 1766 2084 1158 1759 1671 1954 1711 1983 1679 1664 2826 1380 770 1985 1294 1799 936 1810 1563 1805 1562 3364 1360 1298 1739
1927 1949 1962 1937 1908 1957 1906 1925 1947 1919 1917 1954 1953 1951 1923 1926
$6,389,000 $4,350,000 $3,750,000 $3,610,000 $2,600,000 $2,280,000 $2,275,000 $2,188,000 $2,030,000 $1,275,000 $1,050,000
6 3 5 4 5 4 5 4 2 2 3
$1,592,000 $1,240,000 $1,220,000 $3,000,000 $1,378,000 $1,320,000 $1,200,000 $976,000 $960,000 $937,500 $880,000 $865,000 $856,000
PREV. PRICE
PREV. SOLD
$879,000
02/08/2002
$915,000
03/12/2014
$932,500 $129,500
04/01/2003 08/20/1982
$761,000 $941,500 $1,850,000 $1,775,000
09/20/1995 02/05/2013 12/05/2003 08/30/2012
$1,345,000 $1,915,000 $380,000 $1,700,000 $1,588,000 $275,000 $1,350,000 $310,000 $710,000 $1,020,000 $390,000
09/18/2002 09/09/2011 09/19/1988 04/10/2014 11/24/2009 09/15/2000 01/06/2012 03/21/1986 10/23/1992 02/13/2013 08/23/1996
1946 1968 1958 1926 1987 2009 1930 1954 1921 1978 1946 1929 1969 2007 1923 1959 1941 1937 1931 2004 1972 2009 1974 1950 1926 1996 1956 1956 2006 1951 2011 1941 1982 1973 2001 1925 1956 1890 2002 1926 1973 1924 1910 1923 1948 1923 1984 1948 2008 1952 1926 1924 1883 2007 1950 1958
$3,083,000 $830,000 $102,500 $195,000 $737,500
10/01/2013 03/20/2009 02/10/1978 08/24/1983 11/03/2000
$230,000
07/30/1999
$600,000 $795,000 $1,090,000 $990,000 $975,000 $1,000,000 $340,000 $550,000 $367,000 $440,000
12/31/2009 11/29/2011 09/17/2010 10/31/2006 08/27/2010 09/19/2011 05/22/2003 01/16/1998 04/26/2001 04/23/1999
$219,000 $642,000
06/20/1997 03/14/2013
5827 3702 3152 4006 3212 2577 2642 2975 2099 1679 1452
4 5 7 3 3 4 4 2 4 3 3 2 3
$325,000
12/29/1999
$348,000 $320,000 $235,000 $720,000
02/10/1998 07/24/1992 03/24/1999 11/03/2009
$719,000 $886,000 $740,000 $335,000 $215,000 $781,000
06/27/2005 12/30/2010 02/15/2012 07/14/1994 01/25/2002 04/15/2013
$352,500 $705,000 $731,500 $580,000 $168,000
09/28/2012 01/18/2005 08/12/2005 04/04/2008 01/30/1987
$710,000 $175,000 $630,000 $762,000 $763,000
08/29/2007 02/09/1987 10/29/2013 02/19/2014 07/21/2009
$435,000 $665,000 $575,000 $656,000 $490,500 $625,000
04/17/2003 07/24/2013 05/03/2002 09/29/2009 07/03/2002 10/23/2012
1928 1947 1951 1928 1935 1928 1937 1928 1951 1952 1947
$4,700,000 $4,116,000 $2,860,000 $825,000 $1,830,000 $1,585,000
05/23/2012 10/04/2013 12/17/2013 04/15/1993 11/09/2007 12/02/2008
$958,000
07/11/2003
$900,000 $898,000
02/13/2008 06/03/2005
3512 3614 3457
1999 1989 1941
$1,300,000 $419,000
09/03/2008 10/21/1998
4100 2846 1855 2354 1660 2577 2496 1370 1236 1532
1905 1913 1907 1923 1950 1954 1909 1926 1913 1965
$2,060,000 $965,000 $298,000
02/22/2006 11/18/2008 07/18/1994
$706,000 $85,500 $579,000 $639,000 $640,000 $95,000
02/10/2005 05/05/1976 08/24/2010 09/23/2011 09/26/2014 02/21/1978
Marcel Duchamp in Pasadena The Pasadena Art Museum's 1963 retrospective of the iconoclast's work garnered international recognition for the underappreciated artist and museum. BY WILLIAM HACKMAN
Marcel Duchamp (left) and Walter Hopps at the opening of Duchamp's 1963 retrospective at the Pasadena Art Museum
PHOTO: Julian Wasser. Courtesy of Julian Wasser and Craig Krull Gallery, Santa Monica
L
egendary curator and museum director Walter Hopps’ greatest triumph — and the show that marked the Pasadena Art Museum indelibly on the map of modern art — was the 1963 Marcel Duchamp retrospective. Duchamp was not an unfamiliar name within the art world in the early ’60s, but he wasn’t recognized as the pivotal figure he is thought to be today. A 1959 monograph on the artist had been a major turning point, yet neither the Philadelphia Museum of Art, home to the Arensberg Collection since the mid-’50s, nor any of the several major institutions in New York, which had been Duchamp’s home since the teens, had been moved to organize a major retrospective. It fell to Hopps to set the record right, and it was a responsibility he relished. The Pasadena Art Museum’s then-director, Thomas Leavitt, had initially suggested a Jasper Johns show for the fall 1963 slot, but Hopps countered with his Duchamp proposal. The young curator regarded it, along with the Kurt Schwitters exhibition and a Joseph Cornell show he planned to mount in 1966, as part of a “cycle” that would rebalance the art-historical scales. Hopps had not communicated with Duchamp since their meeting at the Arensberg residence in Hollywood a decade-and-a-half earlier, and Duchamp had long since disavowed his role as an artist, claiming that he devoted himself almost wholly now to chess. The extent to which he was bluffing would become apparent only upon his death five years after the Pasadena show. In any event, the allegedly former artist welcomed Hopps’ query and agreed to his plan. “He remembered me as the boy who used to be so interested in his paintings,” Hopps noted. “I suppose this may have helped me.”
Duchamp also agreed to design the exhibition’s poster, incorporating a work he had produced in the ’20s by altering a wanted poster with photographs of himself in profile and full-face. Everything else he left to Hopps. Hopps’ layout for the show opened with a gallery devoted to photographs and ephemera — “nothing didactic,” he explained, “but interesting divertissements, like a theater lobby.” Visitors were then led through galleries that included early paintings and drawings as well as Duchamp’s designs for chess sets, followed by works from the period that produced Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2) and other Cubist-Futurist paintings. The final gallery housed the optical devices Duchamp had created. Without a doubt, however, the show’s high point was the gallery devoted to the ready-mades and the most mysterious and enthralling of Duchamp’s creations, The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even, more commonly known as The Large Glass. (It was in fact a replica, borrowed from the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, the original in Philadelphia being too fragile to travel.) Duchamp got to town shortly before the opening and checked himself into the Hotel Green, a faded, half-forgotten ornament of Old Pasadena that was but a short walk to the museum. He stopped in at the Grace Nicholson mansion, which housed the museum, daily to consult on the show’s installation and kibitz with the groundskeeper. The installation of the show went smoothly for the most part, with one notable hitch. During a preview, Hopps said, a “bunch of Art Alliance women” were smiling their –continued on page 37 05.15 ARROYO | 35
36 | ARROYO | 05.15
Andy Warhol, Billy Al Bengston and Dennis Hopper at the Duchamp opening, with Ferus Gallery's Irving Blum in the background at left.
PHOTO: Julian Wasser. Courtesy of Julian Wasser and Craig Krull Gallery, Santa Monica
–continued from page 35
way through the galleries, “tongue-clucking about Marcel Duchamp,” when they came upon Duchamp’s notorious Fountain, the inverted pissoir that had apparently not lost its power to scandalize viewers more than 40 years after its first appearance. One look “and they go nattering to Harold Jurgensen,” Hopps recalled. The board president found Hopps and led him to the gallery. Pointing at the urinal, Jurgensen told Hopps, “I want to know your statement. Is that art? Yes or no.” Yes, came the answer. “Fine,” replied Jurgensen. “That settles it.” The Los Angeles Times society pages couldn’t get enough of the “slight, soft-spoken French gentleman” who had once drawn a mustache on the Mona Lisa, “the mystery man of modern art” now in the city’s midst. The show’s opening was the event of the season, with a black-tie dinner before the “once-in-a-lifetime exhibition” and another formal reception after. “Society and Art Worlds Converge,” buzzed one Times headline. “They Came, They Saw — Duchamp Conquered,” trumpeted another. Artists swarmed the galleries in rented tuxedos, but the newspaper was far more interested in international jetsetters who had come “cloud-hopping into Our Town” to sup with the San Marino swells. One “international authority,” gushed the Times reporter, had an “unmistakable British appearance and accent.” For all the excitement, however, once natives had been introduced to Duchamp, “most people there didn’t know how to deal with him,” the collector Donald Factor said with a laugh, remembering the after-party at Jurgensen’s home. “They sort of kept their distance and stared.” The artists reconvened at
the Hotel Green, soon joined by Hopps and Duchamp. Andy Warhol, on his first West Coast trip, drank a bit too much pink champagne but discovered that “in California, in the cool night air, you even felt healthy when you puked — it was so different from New York.” Artist Joe Goode, who was then living in Hopps’ house, had everyone sign a tablecloth, Duchamp included, and presented it to his landlord in lieu of rent. Duchamp and his wife, accompanied by Hopps and half a dozen other friends, decamped for a weekend in Las Vegas. The famous photograph of Duchamp playing chess with a naked Eve Babitz in front of The Large Glass was taken at the museum a week later. The New Painting of Common Objects show in 1962 had certified the ascent of Pop Art to the firmament of major art movements on both coasts. With the Duchamp retrospective a year later, Hopps illuminated the historical foundations of Pop by bringing the elusive Dadaist from the margins of 20th-century art to its vital center. In the process, he had brought international recognition to his museum and made it the centerpiece of the L.A. art scene. “In all of L.A.,” said Hal Glicksman, then Pasadena Art Museum preparator, “that was the place to be.” All that remained was to convince the locals. ||| Excerpted from Out of Sight: The Los Angeles Art Scene of the Sixties by William Hackman, published by Other Press on April 14, 2015. Copyright © William Hackman. Reprinted by permission of Other Press. 05.15 ARROYO | 37
38 | ARROYO | 05.15
PHOTO: Jordi Alcalà
ART CENTER’S EXPERIMENTAL FRAME IN SPAIN
The partially completed pavilion, July 2014
Students devised and built a sustainable igloo-shaped pavilion on the Costa Brava. BY MORRIS NEWMAN
–continued on page 41
05.15 ARROYO | 39
40 | ARROYO | 05.15
Thumbs up from team members inside the air bladder INSET: The site on Spain’s Costa Brava offers expansive views of the Mediterranean Sea.
HERE’S ONE WAY TO SPEND A CHRISTMAS HOLIDAY ON THE COAST OF SPAIN: CONSTRUCT A SMALL BUILDING THAT HAS NO STRAIGHT LINES, USING EXPERIMENTAL MATERIALS THAT SOMETIMES FALL APART. ADD TO THAT AN INEXPERIENCED WORKFORCE, MADE UP OF YOUNG PEOPLE, NOT ALL OF WHOM
PHOTOS: James Meraz
SPEAK THE SAME LANGUAGE AS THEIR SPANISH COWORKERS. For a group of students from Pasadena’s Art Center College of Design, the act of building a one-of-a-kind work/play pavilion on the Costa Brava was alternately inspiring and bracing. “At every moment, there was the question, ‘Is this going to work?’” says James Meraz, one of three Art Center faculty members who advised on the construction project as part of a course on environmental design. The assignment was to design and build an environmentally sustainable structure using new technologies. Faculty encouraged students to research new alternatives to traditional building techniques, such as “stick building” (constructing an entire building onsite with pieces of lumber), in order to reduce waste on construction sites. “This was an extreme learning experience,” Meraz says.
The resulting structure — inspired by Buckminster Fuller’s interest in natural geometry and built last year on a private estate — used a novel combination of sophisticated engineering software and natural materials native to both Spain and Pasadena (where the project was mocked up), which both have Mediterranean climates: The windows are tinted with pine sap, and the entire structure is covered in local sand. The outward roughness of the building, which resembles an irregular geodesic dome, appears almost improvised, as if the pavilion were an exercise in free-form building. In actuality, however, the Costa Brava pavilion is the product of deliberate choices — using high-end programs like Grasshopper and Daisy, students continually modeled, tested and redesigned the project, sometimes in the midst of construction. (When the actual structure took shape, student Xiaoyu [Sean] Chen said he marveled at how closely the real thing resembled the computer model.) The project was the result of a special arrangement with Cloud 9, a cutting-edge Barcelona-based architectural firm, which wanted to work with Art Center students on a real-life project with an actual client. Known as a “sponsored” studio, this arrangement brings students into contact with working design professionals, according to David Mocarski, chair of Art Center’s Environmental Design Department. The genesis of the Costa Brava project was in a Pasadena classroom, where students were asked to compete in designing it. Chen produced a design inspired, in part, by the spiral shape of a pine cone. “I was thinking of something futuristic that would also use bio-mimicry,” says the student. To minimize waste, plywood sheets used as formwork –continued on page 43 05.15 ARROYO | 41
42 | ARROYO | 05.15
Raising the second layer, with plywood window forms, that will be draped over the first INSET: The first of the windowpanes is installed.
PHOTOS: Top, James Meraz; Inset, Marga Ruiz
–continued from page 41
(molds for creating supports) for the structural “cells” on the structural shell were reused as window elements. Another experiment was the use of polyethylene fibers for binding together concrete, rather than binding it with traditional metal rebar (reinforcing steel). The fibers, which weigh far less than rebar, lightened the load on the overall structure, while avoiding wasting metal. Meraz says these experiments could ultimately be applied to real-world home building. The big challenge of the pavilion, however, was to introduce students to the complexity of construction. That meant designing a project, engineering the load on every joint in the structure and finally venturing onto a construction site, where unexpected problems are a daily occurrence. A particularly tense moment came when students tried to ascertain whether the concrete exoskeleton could stand by itself without support. Serving as support was a giant rubber bladder that had been inflated to the size of the structural shell, so it could hold up the wet concrete as it dried. The students held their breaths as they deflated the balloon. At that point, the structure failed, collapsing into a pile of rubble. With less than a week left to build the entire project, the students had little time for panic or despair. Instead, they immediately phoned the Texas manufacturer that made the bladder. After a series of consultations, the students and the manufacturers arrived at a way to stabilize the shaky balloon. The next concrete pour was a success. Meraz says the project “put students into high-level positions of construction management that they had not been in before,” which turned out to be a jarring introduction for Wendy Han, an Art Center student during the Cloud 9 project. One difficulty occurred early on, when trucks and cranes delivered more than 250 individual parts to the site. Han acknowledges she had not figured out a way to organize all the pieces at the construction site. “I’m the one who is supposed to be in charge of the list [of construction materials] and I thought I could handle it onsite,” she recalls. “There’s so much pressure when 20 people are
waiting for you to make the call.” Adding to the difficulty was the volunteer assistance of engineers employed by the Costa Brava government, who didn’t know English. “We were working with strangers who spoke different languages,” says Han. “It was quite difficult.” Students interviewed for the story all said the construction experience would have a lasting influence on their design outlook. Han, who currently works full-time at a Pasadena design firm, says she enjoyed combining 21st-century digital technology with natural materials that have been available to builders for millennia. “The combination of the digital and the ancient really matches my own personal manifesto,” she says of the pavilion, which she describes as a combination of spirituality and technology. “It’s not technology for technology’s sake,” she says. Instead, “this is design for soul’s sake.” The technology, she adds, is “just a tool for us to build the structure.”|||| 05.15 ARROYO | 43
KITCHEN CONFESSIONS
Streu-barb If it's spring, it must be rhubarb-streusel season. BY LESLIE BILDERBACK
44 | ARROYO | 05.15
PHOTO: Leslie Bilderback
S
ince our winter was over in the blink of an eye this year, my desire for spring recipes was prematurely activated, and I have been stalking the produce sections, looking for something besides citrus (which, although wonderful, gets boring after five months). Then last month, I saw it. Tiny red stalks peeking out from underneath the leafy beets and chards. Rhubarb. At last. Unfortunately, it was running about $10 a pound. It’ll probably go down in the coming months, at which time I will use it so much that I will get as sick of it as I am sick of citrus right now. Rhubarb is grown as a vegetable in the West, but it was first used as a medicinal plant in China, its roots coveted for their cathartic and laxative qualities. It was known to the Arabs, Greeks and Romans, and was traded along the Silk Road, demanding a higher price than saff ron and cinnamon. Marco Polo wrote about it a lot, and it is thought that he made special treks in search of a source. Arabic influence brought rhubarb trade to Venice by the early 1600s, and a few decades later it made its way through Europe. Attempts to cultivate the medicinal plant in Europe never yielded one of a quality equal to that of the Chinese. Europeans did discover, however, upon the procurement of cheap sugar, that rhubarb had delicious culinary value. When it made its way to the colonies, it caught on fast. (Its arrival is often credited to Ben Franklin. Geez, what didn’t that guy do?) Rhubarb spread west with pioneers, who renamed it “pie plant,” a name you might recognize if you are a Laura Ingalls Wilder fan. Today it is grown most frequently as an ornamental plant, its fl avorful possibilities all but unknown to the general public. Its most common usage in these parts is as a show business device to simulate unintelligible speech. Used since the early days of radio, actors mumbling “rhubarb, rhubarb” sound surprisingly like a much larger crowd. I’m pretty sure my love for rhubarb, in part, comes from the surge of superiority I feel whenever I bring it up to the checkout. Even in the “good” stores, cashiers still search for “red celery” on their produce code cheat sheets. (This is where I would typically rant for 15 minutes about the lack of customer service in the modern world. Just
insert your own similar thoughts here, because I need to stay on task.) I know rhubarb well, because we had it growing in our yard when I was a kid and would eat the stalks raw, dipped in sugar. Having been warned against eating the poisonous leaves, we would dare each other to eat as close to them as we could. There are a dozen things that you can make with rhubarb, including pickles, jam, chutney, upside-down cake, tarts and pie. It is seemingly always paired with strawberries, because the two come into season together, and the berry's sweetness is considered the perfect foil for the tart rhubarb. But I am not a fan of baked strawberries. Their muted colors are visually unimpressive, and I don’t need their sweetness. When it comes to dessert, I prefer unadulterated rhubarb, in its simplest form. My mother’s go-to dessert, apple crisp, would get a spring makeover with rhubarb. And to me that is still the world’s best dessert. It’s easy, fast and really, really good. The thing that makes a crisp so easy is the streusel. It is a German word, from the same root as streuen or strew, meaning something scattered. And scatter is exactly what you do with streusel, on top of coffee cakes, muffins, pies and, best of all, fruit. (By the way, it is totally unrelated to strudel, which is a completely different Viennese dessert.) In this country it is frequently called crisp, crumble or crumb topping. It is not — I repeat, not — a cobbler topping, although it is frequently mislabeled as such. (Cobbler topping is a dough, not a crumble.) Streusel’s crumbly texture comes from butter, sugar and flour. When baked, it becomes crispy, chewy and
caramelized, all at the same time. Streusel is an easy mixture to make, and even easier if you make a large batch ahead and keep it in the freezer, which is what we do in the bakery business. The recipe couldn’t be easier. Bakers use a ratio of 1:1:2:, which translates to one part butter, one part sugar and two parts flour. The process is simple, but the real beauty comes in your ability to play around with flavor. Use any sugar, any flour and any type of garnish you’d like. Mix white, brown or date sugar with whole-wheat, rye, buckwheat or glutenfree flour. Add oats, nuts, seeds or spices to complete your creation. For instance, you can make your streusel with date sugar, coconut, macadamia nuts and a pinch of nutmeg to top off your pineapple coffee cake or banana muffins. Or use raw sugar with whole-wheat flour, oats, flax, sesame and sunflower seeds to top bran muffins, or a pan full of ripe pears and pomegranate seeds for a hearty autumnal crisp. A brown-sugar, whole-wheat streusel with pecans and allspice is lovely on top of pumpkin bread. And finely grated lemon or orange zest, along with a pinch of dried thyme, will make a great streusel to top your boysenberry pie. The possibilities really are endless. But to me, the best, most delicious version of streusel is the original, sprinkled generously on top of a pan of rhubarb. Streusel and rhubarb — a match made in heaven. |||| Leslie Bilderback, a certified master baker, chef and author of No-Churn Ice Cream (St. Martin’s Griffin), lives in South Pasadena and teaches her techniques online at culinarymasterclass.com.
Rhubarb Crisp
I have augmented my mom’s version a bit, because that is what kids do. INGREDIENTS 2 pounds rhubarb, washed and cut into 1-inch chunks 2 cups sugar 1 tablespoon cornstarch or all-purpose fl our Grated zest of one orange ½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
Pinch of kosher salt 2 cups all-purpose fl our 1 teaspoon ground cardamom 2 sticks (8 ounces) unsalted butter, diced and chilled
METHOD 1. Preheat oven to 350°. Coat a 9-by-13–inch pan with butter or pan spray. 2. In a large bowl, combine rhubarb, 1 cup sugar, cornstarch, zest, nutmeg and salt. Toss to coat thoroughly, and transfer to prepared pan. 3. In that same bowl, combine remaining sugar, flour and cardamom. Toss to mix, then add butter. Cut it in until the mixture resembles a coarse meal. It should be loose but hold together when pinched. 4. Sprinkle streusel over rhubarb, covering in as even a layer as possible. Big chunks are just fine. Bake until the fruit is bubbly, and the crisp is golden. Serve warm with a dollop of vanilla ice cream or whipped cream. (Yes, Cool Whip is perfectly acceptable here.) 05.15 | ARROYO | 45
A SELECTIVE PREVIEW OF UPCOMING EVENTS COMPILED BY JOHN SOLLENBERGER
THE LIST
Master Chorale Closes Season with Disney Duo
Spectacular at the L.A. Equestrian Center.
May 1 — The Los
all five days; the charity spectacular,
Angeles Master
which costs $10 to $25, starts at 3:30 p.m.
The family-friendly event features a free multi-breed horse show and competition
Chorale presents the High School Choir
Saturday and features food, music and
Festival, spotlighting the talents of some
open barn areas where guests can visit
800 Southern California students, at 11 a.m.
horses and their handlers. The horse show
Admission is free.
and competitions run from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
May 16 and 17— The chorale’s season
Wednesday through Friday, 9 a.m. to noon
finale features music of Eric Whitacre
Saturday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.
and Arvo Pärt, accompanied by piano
Admission to the spectacular is free for
Gershon at 2 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. Sunday. Tickets cost $29 to $129. Walt Disney Concert Hall is located at 111 S. Grand Ave., L.A. Call (213) 972-7282 or visit lamc.org.
Gala Benefits Foothill Unity Center
ART AND ECLECTIC MUSIC IN SOUTH PAS
children 4 and younger. Proceeds benefit Kure It Cancer Research, Project Hollywood Cars and the Wounded Warrior Project. The L.A. Equestrian Center is located at 480 W. Riverside Dr., Burbank. Call (818) 842-8444 or visit fiestaspanishhorse.org.
May 2 — More than 30 diverse bands perform on five stages along Mission Street many studios and shops host open houses with extended hours during the event,
L.A. Chamber Orchestra Finishes 46th Season
May 2 — Foothill Unity
which runs from 2 to 10 p.m. Food trucks will be on hand. Indie rock and synth-pop
May 7 — Baroque
Center, which helps
band Gardens & Villa (above) headlines the festival. Admission is free.
San Gabriel Valley children and families
at the South Pasadena Eclectic Music Festival and Art Walk. Local art galleries and
Visit eclecticmusicfestival.com.
guitar virtuoso John Schneiderman joins LACO at
in crisis, celebrates its 35th anniversary
7 p.m. for its Baroque Conversations
at Noor Event Center in Pasadena. The
a cocktail reception and silent auction,
Silvering Singles “Unlock” Love
followed at 7:30 p.m. by dinner and a live
May 2 — Super Single
auction. Tickets cost $150. Sponsorships are
Mixers hosts an 8 p.m.
gala evening begins at 5:30 p.m. with
available for $1,000 to $50,000.
Unlock party for singles
Michigan Avenue south of Del Mar
program of concertos by Haydn, Kohaut,
Boulevard, Pasadena. Call (626) 395-4652
Falckenhagen and Vivaldi at Zipper
or visit events.caltech.edu.
Concert Hall. Ticket prices start at $56. Zipper Concert Hall is located at 200 S.
Children’s Voices Raised in Song
Grand Ave., L.A. May 16 — Music Director Jeffrey Kahane
Noor Event Center is located in the
ages 40 to 60 in the Romanesque Room of
May 3 and 10 —
conducts the orchestra at 8 p.m. in a
Paseo Colorado, 260 E. Colorado
Old Pasadena’s historic Green Hotel. The
The L.A. Children’s
world premiere by Ted Hearne and a
Blvd., Pasadena. Call (626) 358-
event features dancing to the tunes of a
Chorus celebrates
performance of Mozart’s Piano Concert
3486 or email Barbara Rolf at
DJ, food, fun stations, handwriting analyses,
Mother’s Day with performances of two
No. 21 and Mendelssohn’s Symphony No.
Barbara@foothillunitycenter.org. Visit
foot reflexology and a free raffle. Guys
commissioned works: the world premiere
4 with featured piano soloist Jonathan Biss
foothillunitycenter.org for information.
get a lock and women get a key, and
of Peter Knell’s “The Vowel Owl” set to John
at Glendale’s Alex Theatre. Ticket prices
are then set loose to meet their matches.
Hollander’s poem; and the L.A. premiere
start at $25, and the concert repeats at
Symphony Season Ends with Rouse and Romeo
Admission costs $20.
of Mark Grey’s “The Plentiful Peach,” based
7 p.m. May 17 at UCLA’s Royce Hall.
The Romanesque Room is located at 50
on a Persian children’s story, with libretto
The Alex Theatre is located at 216 N.
E. Green St., Pasadena. Call (213) 999-
by Niloufar Talebi (above). The program
Brand Blvd., Glendale. Call (213) 622-7001
May 2 — The
9899 or visit supersinglemixers.com.
at Pasadena Presbyterian Church also
or visit laco.org.
includes contemporary and traditional
Pasadena Symphony
songs by Steven Sametz, David Lang,
with a trio of masterworks at Pasadena’s
Political Punchlines
Randall Thompson and more. Both concerts
The Odd Couple Visits Sierra Madre
Ambassador Auditorium. The program
May 2 and 3 — The
start at 7 p.m. Tickets cost $26 to $44.
May 8 through June
features Grieg’s Piano Concerto, Rouse’s
Capitol Steps, a
Pasadena Presbyterian Church is located
27 — Fifty years after
“Rapture” and Prokofiev’s Romeo and
troupe of former
at 585 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena. Call
closes its season
Juliet: Suite 1 and 2. David Lockington
congressional staffers, pokes fun at
conducts, and the featured piano soloist is
politicians of all stripes with parodies
Gabriela Martinez (above). Concerts begin
of popular songs, including gems like
at 2 and 8 p.m. Ticket prices start at $35.
“Puttin’ on a Blitz,” “Everybody Must Get
The Ambassador Auditorium is located at
Droned” and others. The group performs
131 S. St. John Ave., Pasadena. Call (626)
at 8 p.m. Saturday and 3:30 p.m. Sunday
793-7172 or visit pasadenasymphony-
in Caltech’s Beckman Auditorium. Tickets
pops.org.
cost $10 to $40.
The Festival of the Spanish Horse presents
Beckman Auditorium is located on
the Fiesta Charity Horse Show and
46 | ARROYO | 05.15
(626) 793-4231 or visit lachildrenschorus.org.
its Broadway debut, Neil Simon’s The Odd Couple comes to the Sierra Madre Playhouse. Brad David
Horses and Handlers Stir up Funds in Charity Show
Reed (above) stars as Felix and Jack
May 6 through 10 —
male roommates — one neat, one not.
Sundmacher plays Oscar in the Sierra Madre Playhouse production of Simon’s classic comedy about two divorced
Alan Brooks directs. The curtain rises at –continued on page 49
MAIN PHOTO: Tom Griffiths
and organ, led by Artistic Director Grant
05.15 ARROYO | 47
48 | ARROYO | 05.15
THE LIST –continued from page 46
DESCANSO HONORS MOMS, ROSES May 9 and 10 — Pamper Mom with Patina’s Mother’s Day brunch of seasonal salads, carved meats, a baked potato bar, sweets and more. Seatings are at 9 and 11 a.m. both days. The cost is $66 for adults ($57 for members) and $28 for children ($24 for child members). Visit descansoorders.com for reservations, which are required by May 4. May 16 and 17 — Descanso’s Rose Festival celebrates the popular bloom both days with hands on family activitie from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.; floral artist Alison Franchi and makeup artist Jennifer Aspinall create a “human vase” — using a model’s body as a canvas to adorn with roses, body paint, jewels and a gown — from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.; Ensemble Shakespeare Theater performs a humorous, family-friendly production of The Autobiography of Big Bad Wolf at 1 p.m.; and rose garden walks are led at 1:30 p.m. On Saturday, Rachel Young, director of horticulture and garden operations, discusses sustainable roses for California gardens at 10:30 a.m., and sculptor and florist Felixa Funes conducts a flower-crown workshop for all ages from noon to 1:30 p.m. The $35 cost includes all materials. Visit peoplespopup.com/descanso to register. Festival admission is free with regular Descanso admission of $9, $6 for seniors and students and $4 for children 5 to 12; children 4 and younger are admitted free. Descanso Gardens is located at 1418 Descanso Dr., La Cañada Flintridge. Call (818) 949-4200 or visit descansogardens.org.
8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2:30
her commitment-phobic boyfriend. The
p.m. Sundays, with an additional 2:30 p.m.
fantastical story includes a visit from a
Saturday performance June 27. Tickets cost
sea siren and a trip into the time-bending
$25, $22 for seniors, $15 for students ages 13
fourth dimension. Jen Bloom directs.
to 21 and $12 for children 12 and younger.
Untethered starts at 8 p.m. Fridays and
The Sierra Madre Playhouse is located
Saturdays and 7:30 p.m. Sundays through
at 87 W. Sierra Madre Blvd., Sierra
June 7 (no performances on Memorial
Madre. Call (626) 355-4318 or visit
Day weekend). Tickets cost $30.
sierramadreplayhouse.org.
The Mountain View Mausoleum is located at 2300 N. Marengo Ave.,
A Romance Fit for Cemetery Setting
Altadena. Call (323) 960-1054 or visit plays411.com/untethered.
May 8 through June 7 — Julia Edwards’ new play Untethered, a project of the Pasadena
A Place to Call Home May 9 — Pasadena’s
Arts Council’s Emerge Fiscal Sponsorship
Union Station
Program, opens at the Mountain View
Homeless Services
Mausoleum in Altadena. The play is a
presents its annual gala fundraiser, “A
wacky love story about a woman who,
Place to Call Home,” at 5:30 p.m. at the
plagued by nightmares of her lover’s
Langham Huntington, Pasadena. The
demise, suddenly pops the question to
event, which includes a reception, auction, –continued on page 50 05.15 | ARROYO | 49
THE LIST –continued from page 49
CASTLE GREEN HOSTS MOTHER’S DAY TOUR May 10 — Friends of the Castle Green hosts a Mother’s Day tour of the 1898vintage Old Pasadena landmark, designed by Frederick Roehrig using a mixture of Moorish, Turkish and Victorian styles. The self-guided tour allows guests to visit the main salon, the Turkish and Moorish rooms, the penthouse, the ballroom, the sunroom and more than 20 of its private apartments. Light refreshments are included. The tour runs from 1 to 5 p.m. Tickets cost $30. Proceeds benefit Friends of the Castle Green restoration projects. The Castle Green is located at 99 S. Raymond Ave., Pasadena. Visit brownpapertickets.com/event/1206371 for tickets. Call (626) 824-8482 or visit friendsofthecastlegreen.org for information.
dinner and live entertainment, honors
Jim and Tina Hart. Tickets cost $250.
Free Fun at Local Museums
The Langham Huntington, Pasadena
May 17 — Doors are
is located at 1401 S. Oak Knoll Ave.,
open wide for free
Pasadena. Visit unionstationhs.org or call
visits at six museums
supporters Rene and Charlie Chiara and
(626) 240-4557.
in Pasadena and L.A. from noon to 5 p.m. Museums of the
50 | ARROYO | 05.15
Camerata Pacifica Opens Huntington Home
Arroyo Day offers a look at a Civil War
May 12 — The
demonstrations and lessons, adobe
Camerata Pacifica
brick-making, crafts for children and
encampment, a chance to explore a retired LAPD helicopter, Victorian dance
chamber ensemble launches its three-year
adults, woodcarving and blacksmithing
residency at the Huntington Library, Art
demonstrations, self-guided tours and
Collections and Botanical Gardens’ new
numerous other events. Hosts include
auditorium with an 8 p.m. performance of
the Pasadena Museum of History; the
Bach’s complete Brandenburg Concerti.
Gamble House; the Autry’s Southwest
Tickets cost $48.
Museum, Mt. Washington Campus; the
The Huntington Library, Art Collections
Heritage Square Museum; the L.A. Police
and Botanical Gardens is located at
Museum; and the Lummis Home and
1151 Oxford Rd., San Marino. Call (800)
Garden. Free shuttles serve all museums.
357-2224 or visit cameratapacifica.org.
Visit museumsofthearroyo.com. ||||
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