#213: Glendora Bougainvillea
June 15, 2024
The Glendora Bougainvillea is the largest planting of the vine in the US, and a living connection to the story of the citrus industry that helped to build LA around the turn of the 20th century.
Nature
#150: Vasquez Rocks (Agua Dulce)
May 5, 2023
Visit the Vasquez Rocks for a lil' slice of Mars less than an hour out of LA. These heaving piles of sandstone jut out at impossible angles, yielding an alien landscape that's backdropped westerns, horror flicks and sci-fi epics since the 1920s. Read on for a capsule history of the Rocks, with cameos from the indigenous Tataviam, the Spanish missionaries, and the Mexican bandit that gave the Vasquez Rocks their name.
#133: Exposition Park Rose Garden
January 3, 2023
With over 19,000 rosebushes in hundreds of varietals, the Exposition Park Rose Garden is one of the largest public rose gardens in the United States. It's been open since 1928, and looks pretty much the same today as it did back then.
#123: Natural History Museum (Exposition Park)
October 23, 2022
The Natural History Museum is justifiably famous for its awe-inspiring dinosaur skeletons and taxidermied animals. But did you know it was also an art museum for 50 years? Or that Exposition Park was once a hotbed of illicit activity like drinking, gambling and...camel racing?
#113: Descanso Gardens (La Cañada Flintridge)
August 25, 2022
Descanso Gardens preserves 150 acres of flowers and plants from habitats around the world. But its long history is also a human one, telling stories of horticulture and architecture, racism and war, and the effort to preserve green space in a rapidly urbanizing Los Angeles.
Roadtrip: Etan Does Idyllwild
May 20, 2022
For my 40th birthday, I visited the NRHP-listed landmarks in the SoCal mountain town of Idyllwild: a livable yellow UFO, a John Lautner cabin made of tree trunks and zig-zagging glass, a wooded State Park and a modernist tram station at 8,500 feet.
#27: Christmas Tree Lane (Altadena)
November 4, 2021
A 100+ year holiday tradition that began with a handful of deodar cedar seeds from Altadena's founding family, the Woodburys Added to the National Register of Historic Places on September[…]