Setting
Though the neighborhood has gone through a period of urban decay and now urban renewal, the building, replete with angels at every corner, has lost none of its ethereal beauty and elan, making it truly one of the classic examples of Beelman's architecture left standing in the modern world. The building is now vacant, mainly used as a rental for movie shoots and special events, however, the City of Los Angeles thought the architecture significantly important enough to warrant a City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department Historic-Cultural Monument No. 267, as far back as the early 1980s. This is significant in that many other Wilshire Boulevard area landmarks fell prey to the wrecking ball during that time period, such as the notable Brown Derby. Luckily, despite the demolition of important landmarks all around it, the grand entrance and ballroom of the Elk's No. 99 / Park Plaza building still bears its old "jazz age" grandeur, much to the relief of Los Angeles architectural aficionados. The elaborate interior murals and decorative paintings were designed and executed by Anthony Heinsbergen and Co, noted painter of many Los Angeles cultural landmarks. The central design of the lobby ceiling is based on the Villa Madama, a Renaissance era project by Raphael and Giulio Romano.
Read more about this topic: Park Plaza Hotel (Los Angeles)
Famous quotes containing the word setting:
“Dandyism is the last flicker of heroism in decadent ages.... Dandyism is a setting sun; like the declining star, it is magnificent, without heat and full of melancholy. But alas! the rising tide of democracy, which spreads everywhere and reduces everything to the same level, is daily carrying away these last champions of human pride, and submerging, in the waters of oblivion, the last traces of these remarkable myrmidons.”
—Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)
“We don’t arrive at it by standing on one leg or on the first day of our setting out—but though we may jostle one another on the way that is no reason why we should strike or trample—elbowing’s enough.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“The trees stand in the setting sun,
I in their freckled shade
Regard the cavalcade of sin,
Remorse for foolish action done,
That pass like ghosts regardless, in
A human image made....”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)