Even though snow is not on our weather menu here in Los Angeles, it does get rather chilly in the autumn and winter, particularly in the evenings. As the sun sets and the shadows gather, the best course of action to keep warm is to have some delicious soup. Luckily, we live in foodie heaven, and there are infinite options for this heartwarming dish in every neighborhood we serve, be it Silver Lake, Los Feliz, Highland Park, Mt. Washington, or the Valley. Here are some recent favorites that we would love to recommend:

PINE AND CRANE

If you are in Silver Lake, head to Pine and Crane to savor the steamy goodness of the fragrant Taiwanese beef noodle soup.  Served in beautiful artisan ceramic bowl, it’s packs an aromatic punch, and is certain to help you power through the holiday season.

GOOD GIRL DINETTE

Providing liquid bliss to the residents of Highland Park for the last 5 years is the local favorite Good Girl Dinette. Headed by the visionary chef Diep Tran, who aptly defined the restaurant as  “American diner meets Vietnamese comfort food,” Good Girl Dinette feels chic and bohemian while serving amazing Pho ( vegetarian options available) and yummy, hearty bowls of Porridge.

RAMEN BANGAICHI

If you are hunkering for a bowl of ramen, Ramen Bangaichi of Silver Lake offers a flavorful rendition of this beloved Japanese dish. Established 50 years ago in Tokyo, Japan, the first Bangaichi restaurant was located at the Tokyo Railway Station, near the Imperial Palace grounds and the Ginza commercial district, and we feel pretty fortunate that it came to Los Feliz. We recommend Ginger Ramen, a delicious collage of char-siu pork, bamboo shoots, green onions, bean sprouts, and a fair dash of ginger, to comfort the spirit and sooth the soul.

TAIX

Taix, an Echo Park stalwart, was established in 1927 and has been operated by three generations of the Taix family. The sprawling interior includes a large dining hall and a cozy bar area with retro ambiance that’s appreciated by a diverse demographic – you are equally likely to encounter a multi-generational family or a flock of the young and hip (particularly on Wednesday evenings, when local artists take over the bar for “Social Club”, a night of DJ’ing and socializing). The daily soups range from Minestrone to Clam Chowder, with the Onion Soup classic in rotation throughout the week. Settle down into a soft armchair and enjoy your abundant tureen of French country cuisine as you watch the fireplace and feel your worries melt away.

We are pretty excited about our upcoming loft listing in the Arts District and thought this would be a great opportunity to revisit the area’s fascinating history that spans from agrarian endeavors to performance art.

It seems incredible to imagine, but in the mid-nineteenth century, the concrete expanse that we now know as the Arts District was a flourishing vineyard. Entitled El Aliso, the vineyard was planted by Jean-Louis Vignes, who arrived in Pueblo de Los Angeles from France in 1831. Within a mere 20 years, he had become the largest producer of wine in California and the first person to plant an orange grove in LA. Inspired by Vignes, additional citrus growers moved into the area. All this industrious production required transportation, so a network of railroads sprung up to accommodate the shipping needs. In turn, the presence of these railroads attracted further manufacturing  — thus, the industrial architecture designed to optimize production gradually moved in and replaced the orchards.

 

1897. “Young boys fill a small gasoline powered streetcar of the ‘Mateo Street & Santa Fe Ave. Street Car Co.’ seen traveling on an unpaved Santa Fe Avenue at 9th Street.”

Taking advantage of the many rail depots, by the 1910s and 1920s, the Arts District was teeming with businesses producing rubber, auto parts, and furniture. The Barker Brothers Building, where we sold two loft residencies this year, actually used to be a furniture factory. As Los Angeles grew and incorporated the outlying communities of Highland Park, Eagle Rock, and Boyle Heights, the city of LA zoned the Arts District for industrial uses. This seemed to seal the city’s fate as an array of warehouses and factories. However, by the end of WW2, things had shifted once again.

An aerial view dated 1924 of the Barker Bros. factory and warehouses. Image via Los Angeles Public Library Photo Collection.

As industrial needs evolved, railroads began to be eclipsed by the  large trucks – and those had difficulty the infrastructure built with railroads  in mind. Manufacturing began to move away to other neighborhoods, and the disused warehouse spaces began to decline.  By 1970s, artists started moving into the  abandoned buildings,  turning them into live/work studios and opening galleries. By the 1980s the former manufacturing hub was a bustling art scene, and the city passed a new ordinance that allowed artists to legally continue in their old factories and commercial buildings.

By the mid 1980s, the artists’ community was huge –  Merion Estes, Marnie Weber Joe Fay, George Herms, Mary Jones, Constance Mallinson, Paul McCarthy, Lari Pittman, John Schroeder, Judy Simonian, Andy Wilf, and Takako Yamaguchi all lived downtown. It was these artists, and the spaces they opened – like LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions), PØST gallery,  Al’s Bar on Traction Avenue, ARCO Center for Visual Art on Flower Street and others, that gave Arts District its name. In words of the LA Times critic, William Wilson written in 1985: “Nothing in recent years has so beguiled the indigenous cultural imagination as the vision of downtown Los Angeles transformed into a glittering art Mecca.”

As art hubs moved to Chinatown and beyond in late 1990’s and 2000’s, the formerly industrial spaces continued to be adaptively reused and redeveloped – case in point is the beautiful Toy Factory Building, the location of the exquisite loft residence we are about to bring on the market, and all the revitalized spaces nearby, such as Urban Radish Market, Daily Dose Coffee, Church & State, Bestia, and Hauser & Wirth, and Sprueth Mager galleries, and many more – offering artful nourishment for the body and soul amidst the heart of Los Angeles history.

The Tracy Do Real Estate team is so honored to be voted The Best in Real Estate for the 4th year in a row. We love the vibrant neighborhood of Silver Lake and are so grateful for your support. It makes us incredibly happy to be a part of this amazing community.

We love all the Eastside neighborhoods we work in, helping people buy and sell homes in Los Feliz, Echo Park, Highland Park, Eagle Rock and Mt. Washington – but we will always hold a special place in our hearts for Silver Lake. It was there that in 2002 Tracy Do began her journey in real estate, assisting her first client with a purchase of a lovely mid-century home in the beautiful Silver Lake neighborhood of Moreno Highlands. Since that time, the Tracy Do team has grown – becoming the leader in real estate sales throughout the Eastside and setting a standard of innovative excellence that yields measurable results for our clients.

The Tracy Do team is committed to representing properties in the most advantageous way and negotiating the very best terms for our clients. All our agents are passionate about real estate and work hard to manifest our clients’ home dreams into reality. Our team is deeply rooted in Eastside Los Angeles and is considered to be the top realtors across Silver Lake, Highland Park, Los Feliz, Eagle Rock, Mt. Washington, Atwater Village, and beyond. Living in the neighborhoods we service gives us the insight and expertise to provide the best advice to our clients as they navigate the Los Angeles real estate market.

 

We are honored by the trust that the Silver Lake community placed in us by voting us the best in Real Estate. If you are thinking about buying or selling a property, we would love to help.  Call or text us anytime at 323-842-4001, send us a message here or follow our Instagram.

A chance to represent a property designed by one the most iconic architects in Southern California is a great honor, and we are getting ready to do just that – keep an eye out for an opportunity to rent and inhabit an R.M. Schindler-designed Silver Lake home.

Famous for his idiosyncratic style that combined complex, Cubist-like sequences of forms with everyday materials such as stucco exteriors, standard wood frames, and built-in plywood, Rudolph Schindler called his own take on modern architecture “Space Architecture”, maintaining a focus on the design of interior space by carefully planning how the built environment would affect climate, light, mood, and, ultimately, the liveability of a space. 

Originally from Vienna, as a young man Rudolph studied under Otto Wagner, an Austrian architect who was one of the pioneers of the International Style that aimed to shape, rather than decorate, space built with reinforced concrete, metal, and glass. Schindler then moved to Chicago in 1914, hoping to obtain a position with Frank Lloyd Wright, whose architectural practice he had long admired from afar. The young architect’s wish came true and became the reason why we are so lucky to have his tremendous legacy in Los Angeles – it is here that Frank Lloyd Wright dispatched Schindler in 1920 to supervise the construction of FLW’s most important American commission of the time, the Hollyhock house for oil heiress Aline Barnsdall.

Schindler went on to design more than 250 houses in Los Angeles, beginning with his residence on King’s Road, now home to the MAK center for architecture. His body of work includes a number of apartment buildings, all brilliantly designed to maximize living space and create atmospheric dwellings that are as functional as they are aesthetically pleasing. We are therefore so excited to bring to the market a very special unit situated within The Sachs Apartments, also known as Manola Court. This architectural landmark was a focus of Rudolph Schindler’s work between 1926 and 1940, commissioned by his friend and client, the Romanian-born muralist and interior designer Herman Sachs, whose credits include the interior of Union Station. 

Located in the heart of Silver Lake, The Sachs Apartment complex is comprised of three buildings, gracefully cascading down a terraced hill and interconnected by a series of garden walkways and steps. The architecture appears weightless due to the building’s multitude of glass panels and network of beams and wood, which frame the balconies and patios that punctuate the site. Inside, it’s classic Schindler: the walls and ceiling are clad in gorgeous wood, with intricately designed built-in features that will accommodate all life’s moments – from solitary meditation in front of a glass wall to hosting a starlit soiree on the terrace. Available for lease early next week — stay tuned.