Kitchenware and Tableware Market

When an air photographer snapped his shutter in a fly-over of Fred and Florence Bixby’s Long Beach ranch in 1936, time seemed to have stood still. Groomed fields surrounded their home, nestled in a shady grove of pepper trees around a patio designed by local plantsman Paul Howard. What the photographer framed out of his pastoral vista was nearby Signal Hill. Car travel was pushing oil exploration, and the lessee of Signal Hill, Shell Oil, struck black gold in 1921 at derrick Alamitos No. 1. Thousands of gallons a day from that well and the dozens that followed on Signal Hill and at nearby Seal Beach transformed a Spanish rancho into a supplier to global petroleum markets. Read about what was gained and what was forever lost in our Lost L.A. column on Rancho Los Alamitos. 

– Sam Watters

Photo credit: Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation

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Central to the promise of the California dream is the idea that you can reach out your kitchen window and pluck a lemon. As we hit the natural limits to our water supply, that specter of home-grown fruit remains steadily possible, even a social ideal in the complex matrix of energy and water footprints.

In attaining it, the first hurdle is choice: What kind of lemon? What about oranges and limes? A modest lot in Los Angeles can produce full loads of not only citrus but also avocados, plums, apricots and nectarines. And don’t forget figs, pomegranates and apples. A long list only becomes longer when you consider the varieties and crosses available for each type of fruit. Valencia orange or blood? Eureka lemon or Meyer? Plum or aprium?

Choice of fruit trees is one of the most important decisions that you’ll make in a garden. You’ll be eating the results for years to come. So rather than wish that you had planted a Fuerte or Guatemalan avocado instead of a Hass, consider spending the weekend of Aug. 14 at the Festival of Fruit sponsored by the Los Angeles Chapter of the California Rare Fruit Growers and Cal Poly Pomona Agriculture Department.

The organizers are the best kind of experts — euphoric enthusiasts — so don’t be shy. The worst thing that could happen to you is being showered with tips. If you have an old avocado tree but don’t know the type, pluck a fruit and take it to show Julie Frink, volunteer at the UC South Coast Research and Extension Center and chief compiler of an excellent UC extension guide to varieties. She will be talking on avocados at 10 a.m. Stay in your chair for the next session if you’re looking for a spineless cactus for a school garden.

Beyond many sessions touching on topics that include fruit tree care, grapes, honeybees, canning, dragon fruit and jujubes, there will be tours. Four days of field trips begin on Thursday at the UC field station in Irvine. Other institutions hosting festival tours include the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino; the Fullerton Arboretum; and Cal Poly Pomona’s John T. Lyle Center for Regenerative Studies. Among private gardens on show are a Simi Valley home with pomegranates, sapotes, guavas and quince, and a Brea property with cherimoya and citrus.

A special theme of this festival is dragon fruit, also known as pitahaya. For those of you who haven’t encountered this succulent, or tasted its flaming pink-skinned fruit, there will be nowhere to hide. An Aug. 13 tour of Cal Poly Pomona’s Pitahaya Plantation  will be followed Aug. 14 with a dragon fruit lecture and, no doubt, dragon plant sales.

But one needn’t be in pursuit of rarity or weirdness to benefit from this festival. The enthusiasts behind it lay the table for visitors to browse. On the menu: everything you ever wanted to know about fruit in this our land of fruit and nuts.

– Emily Green

Green's column on sustainable gardening appears here every Friday.

Photos, from top: Eureka lemon. Credit: Los Angeles Times. Staked dragon fruit plant. Credit: Emily Green. Dragon fruit. Credit: Christine Cotter / Los Angeles Times

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If you can't make Bauer's monthly sale of seconds this weekend, don't worry.

The Los Angeles pottery company is offering 20% off first quality Catalina pitchers, Bauer tumblers and Monterey tumblers through Sunday. 

The pieces come in 15 glazes including basic white, black, various blues and greens, and even orange. Four-inch Monterey tumblers, pictured above in green and yellow, normally $15, are now $12 each; the larger 5-inch Bauer tumblers, normally $22, are now $17.60 each. The 34-ounce Catalina pitcher, above, is reduced to $48 from $60. All pieces in Bauer's noted orange glaze are priced slightly higher.

Skip the driving and head over to their online store.

– Lisa Boone

Photo credit: Bauer Pottery

Trove, the Laguna Beach design store known for unconventional antiques, industrial and rustic furniture, and contemporary housewares is celebrating its recent relocation with "Vanishing Cultures," a display of international arts and artifacts.

"We've more than doubled our size," says Heather Lee, co-owner with husband Bobby Lee. The goal of this, the third expansion of Trove since it opened in 2004, is to create "an environment that combines items that have been loved and used over the years with pieces that resonate with our soul."

Set in Trove's stripped down, cinder-block and wood-paneled new space, the upcoming display mixes Continental antiques with Asian objects.

Among them: an 18th century Burmese Buddha, a bronze Vietnamese kettle and a bronze pot from Laos with a lizard and spider motif. 

The textile on the antique chaise, above, a Naga tribe headhunter cloth from Burma, is part of a large collection of textiles, right.

Ethnographic art collector Bill Lanz will speak at the opening reception from 6 to 9 p.m. Thursday.

370 Ocean Ave., Laguna Beach; (949) 376 4640.

– David A. Keeps

Photo credits: Trove

 
The Echo Park design office Scout Regalia is giving new meaning to the term "Made in California" by launching a series of free instruction sheets showing how to build your own furnishings.

The SR Planting Table, above, is the first of the SR Cutsheet Projects. The outdoor plant stand is designed as a simple and affordable project for the average DIYer; it requires only an electric drill, hand saw and countersink drill bit.

"Good design should be accessible to everyone," Scout Regalia co-founder Makoto Mizutani said. "We decided to start the Cutsheet Project as a way of opening up the design-build process to people and hopefully instilling an appreciation for building."

The easy-to-read instruction sheet is available as a free download. Contact Scout Regalia at info@scoutregalia.com.

– Lisa Boone

Photo: Scout Regalia

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I hate to admit that I wanted to steal these napkins when I saw them at a friend's house recently.

Boldly graphic, the oversized Maribel napkins brightened not only plain plates but also my own post-vacation mood.

I was happy to find them on sale when I went looking for them on Crate & Barrel's website. Normally $4.95, the polyester-blend napkins are now $1.95 apiece — an inexpensive, feel-good purchase. The website has several other fun table linens on sale as well, including designs by the Finnish textile studio Marimekko.

– Lisa Boone

Photo: Crate & Barrel

On the first Thursday of every month in San Pedro, art lovers wander the streets of L.A.’s port town hunting for discoveries. If they stop by Gallery 741, proprietors George Woytovich and Patti Kraakevik will gladly show their art, but more treasures reside upstairs in the couple's stunning two-story loft, a former ’30s Montgomery Ward.

Inside their self-described “cabinet of curiosities,” maple floors and natural light streaming through loft windows provide the stage for their vintage gems. A brass spotlight from a Japanese cargo ship faces the Pacific. A blue bumper car from the ’20s flanks a green car from Pacific Ocean Park, the Santa Monica amusement park, circa 1953.

Every turn of the head reveals a different find: a glass case with programs from the opening days of the Empire State and Chrysler buildings. A wall-mounted operating panel and floor dial from the elevator of the original Los Angeles Stock Exchange.

For more on the San Pedro loft, check out our 19-picture PHOTO GALLERY.

– Joshua Lurie

Photo credits: Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times

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Is it possible to live right on bustling Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Venice and still maintain a sense of privacy? Architect Dennis Gibbens' light-filled home proves it can be done.

Long a fan of urban living, Gibbens bought the empty Venice lot in 2005 and imagined building a Parisian-style townhouse where he could live above a shop. Though he likes the bustle of street life, he did not want it to permeate his home. So although the 650-square-foot Japanese art and design store Tortoise on the ground floor has large windows, the two-story living space above it is wrapped in a shell of board-formed concrete. 

The concrete keeps out sound and prying eyes, but it also keeps out light. To find out how Gibbens managed to keep the space bright anyway (hints: reflective surfaces, lots of skylights, central courtyard) — read Emily Young's full story on the architect's "light filled cave," or see it for yourself on our virtual tour of Gibbens' Abbot Kinney home.

– Deborah Netburn

Photos: In one of the smaller bedrooms, a glass wall allows more natural light to spill into the bath. Credit: Nazy Alvarez. The exterior of architect Dennis Gibbens' Abbot Kinney home is set above the storefront and back from the street, behind a concrete wall that also wraps the building's sides. Credit: Ryan Turner

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Artist Leigh Adams says she has an unusual perspective on earthquakes. "Instead of getting upset when something breaks, everyone cheers," she says of her family. "It's called a paradigm shift. I enjoy takingsomething broken and making something whole and wonderful out of it."

Adams' latest paradigm shift is for the birds: She hosts a class on making mosaic birdbaths on Saturday at the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden. In the hands-on workshop, Adams will demonstrate how to use broken tile and glass on saucers or bowls, fused and grouted into place. Everyone, she says, will go home with a finished piece.

The class will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Participants should bring a 12-inch or larger glazed saucer or bowl like the one pictured above. Admission is $40 to $50. Reservations: (626) 821-4623 or e-mail jill.berry@arboretum.org.

– Lisa Boone

Photo credit: Leigh Adams

On Saturday, ReMade Studios, a workshop producing handmade furniture and lighting, hosts an open house during the Frogtown Art Walk. In addition to showcasing the work of metalworker Richard Reyes, photography by Coy Koehler and the art of Eddie Ysais and ReMade co-founder Donna Thasdao Pungprechawat, the show will feature new pieces by ReMade Studios and designs by Gary Ferguson of CaseAndGrain, who has recently been experimenting with charred finishes on reclaimed cedar. 

One highlight: the Threaded Desk Lamp (pictured), created as a collaboration between ReMade founders Pungprechawat and Emette Rivera. Deftly melding old craft techniques with new technology in a piece that references Art Deco and midcentury California studio woodworking, the light has a hand-turned shade made from salvaged wood that sits on a square tube brass frame. 

A web of cotton thread strung through holes drilled into the shade acts as a diffuser for the energy-efficient warm-colored LED lights, creating what Pungprechawat calls "a textured layering and stitching effect that is best seen through the patterns created when the lamps are lit." Versions of the Threaded Desk Lamp, each one unique, will be offered at $300 each.

Frogtown Art Walk is a free, self-guided tour of art spots in the Elysian Valley area of L.A. The walk is from 5 to 10 p.m. Saturday. ReMade Studios is at 1863 Blake Ave., Suite B, Los Angeles.

– David A. Keeps

Photos: ReMade Studios