Sub Modern (Part One)

"How dangerously bourgeois," I wise assed to the latest kid Corbusier, "a few strips of teak on the face of el bloque.  A little charity for the ol' hammer and nail guys?"

"Even if I wanted to build one of your Beaux Arts fantasies," the architect spat, "I couldn't find the craftspeople--they're under six feet of dirt, along with your aesthetic."

(A common lament, blame not my inability to compose the picturesque, to enroll the broad grammar of architecture, sayeth the builder, I am limited by my charges.)

"That's funny," I returned, "because only a couple blocks away is the Queen Anne inspired Stein Building (second and fourth images), erected not in the 1880's, but in the 1980's.  You reckon the finish carpenters were mummies?"

Los Angeles actually boasts dozens of neo free classicals, design throwbacks, and revival revivals; inspiring novelties in a landscape dominated by nuevo Mediterrauseums, and Machine Age rip-offs.

"Stick-n-stucco rules," one custom builder allowed, "because it's fast, cheap and the popular taste."

"Is the blind, leading the blind," I asked.

"You're the critic," he responded, "you tell me."

End Part One