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My World: Looking at Los Angeles and Surrounding Communities: Transformations!

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
100 years ago, Beverly Hills was a place one would escape to in the hot summet months from the bustle of Los Angeles with its busy traffic of carriages, carts and early automobiles.

The homes were acutally very modest inexpensive clapboard or stucco single story dwellings that at best boasted a living room with a nice tile decorated fireplace. There were no swimming pools, just a variety of trees, especially oaks, planted for shade.

In the past 50 years,, one by one, the elderly folk retired. Swimming pools appeared, electric refirigerators replaced ice deliveries and then something abrupt and startling happened.

This was not "Genrtrification" where rich educated urban folk displace inner city struggling ethnic minorities downtown Los Angeles. What happened in Beverly Hills was the transformation of appearance of simple construction to give the image of wealth and luxury.

Asher
 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Let me show you what has evolved:


Here is a typical untouched modest vintage home, my neighbor, abandoned for the past 30 years!





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Asher Kelman: Deserted Green Clapboard House

2 iphone 6+ panoramas, one above the other, stitched in AutoPano Giga
Processed in Photoshop CC 2017
Topaz Clarity




It is in disrepair. Every so often I have to call the police as transients camp there and one fellow was caught trying to rob my house. I chased him for 1/2 a mile before I realized that I was out of breath, not a fighter and unarmed!

The absantee owner just leaves the empty home there, watching it increase in value by virtue of all the new homes that have spring up. Clever fellow!


So here is the home that represents how everythiong started. It's where I get my magnolia flowers, cones and seeds and take pictures of birds of paradise flowers.

Enjoy,

Asher
 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
New Facade and perhaps a reroof!

The changes come suddenly, the front of the house disappears and then some kind of facade is created that makes the entrance more imposing. Usually it is taller, there are imposing steps or columns. All to give the sense thaqt the home is above the modest vintage origins.


Still Modest

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Asher Kelman: Transformation of Simple Homes: New 1950's Windows and a coat of paint

iphone 6+ panoramas, one above the other, stitched in AutoPano Giga
Processed in Photoshop CC 2017
Topaz Clarity





Upward Mobility but Non-pretentious, but Enough to Need Steel Bars!


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Asher Kelman: Transformation of Simple Homes: Brick Facade and a New Roof

iphone 6+ panoramas, one above the other, stitched in AutoPano Giga
Processed in Photoshop CC 2017
Topaz Clarity



Brilliant Minimal Elegance: an Arch and Two Matching Windows

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Asher Kelman: Transformation of Simple Homes: Domed Grand Driveway and Entrance Way and Decorative Windows

iphone 6+ panoramas, one above the other, stitched in AutoPano Giga
Processed in Photoshop CC 2017
Topaz Clarity




Extending the Stucco Facade and a Faux Mansard Roof Adds a flavor of French Authority and Lineage

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Asher Kelman: Transformation of Simple Homes: Faux French Mansard Roof
iphone 6+ panoramas, one above the other, stitched in AutoPano Giga
Processed in Photoshop CC 2017
Topaz Clarity


At this stage, the back yards were not necessarilly encroached apon, but lilely as not a new master Beth was installed with a glass walled shower. Voila, the folk lived in a micro-mansion! Eventually the addition of a pool and a family room became the next improvement.



Asher
 
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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
So, in all these examples, the vintage simple home has been made to appear more elegant and prestigious. For sure they have new bathrooms, but essentially they appear mostly unchanged in layout and living spaces.

The problem is that, here, in Beverly Hills, one can't have an air of success with one's Lexus or Mercedes parked in front of the unadorned house of post #2. That, of course would be so embarrassing!

So the folk simply replaced the front with new skin! Really its quirte funny about human vanity!

Asher
 

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
Hi, Asher,

That is all quite amazing. Thanks for that thorough discussion of the phenomenon.

When I lived in Dallas (until 2007) there was beginning to be a great deal of, in very pleasant neighborhoods with very comfortable (and not inexpensive) homes, generally single-story, people buying a property, razing the existing house, and building a serious "mansion" (typically 2-1/2 stories).

Best regards,

Doug
 
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