"Take the strange, faceless building at Melrose and Sycamore avenues, just up from the house where I grew up. It stood apart from the Melrose Avenue hodgepodge, which included an auto body shop, an old bookstore famous for selling movie scripts, and a trendy boutique that sold vintage fedoras and marked the beginning of Melrose's turn as a fashion mecca."
"In a street filled with signage screaming for your attention ("THOUSANDS OF BOOKS," yelled the bookseller), that corner lot had nothing. Just two concrete-plastered boxes seemingly closed off to the world. The only hint of life was a tree growing from what appeared to be some kind of courtyard hidden from view. I passed by all the time - sneaking a Chunky bar at the corner liquor store, grabbing an ice cream cone from Baskin-Robbins."
Early 1980s Los Angeles often felt like a place where one could brush against greatness without recognizing it. A strange, faceless concrete building at Melrose and Sycamore sat apart from nearby shops, with only a tree hinting at a hidden courtyard. Two concrete-plastered boxes appeared closed to the world despite surrounding storefronts shouting for attention. Teenage attempts to connect with the building while producing a photocopied weekly newspaper ended in leaving copies and eventual abandonment of the effort. Years later the building was identified as the Danziger Studio, one of Frank Gehry's first Los Angeles commissions and praised by critic Reyner Banham as a brilliant elevation of the ubiquitous stucco box.
Read at Los Angeles Times
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