The Cool Hunter, Roaming the globe so you're in the know
TAG: Los Angeles
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February 20 2009
The second U.S. store (after N.Y.) of the Japanese brand BAPE has become a solid street-corner anchor at 8001 Melrose Avenue in L.A. With only a few flimsy palms outside, the eye-catching, BAPE signature camo print in juicy neon tubes strikes a commanding visual presence especially at night.
Inside, a huge glass cylinder, six meters in diameter, dominates the cool 4.5-meter-high space. Inside the cylinder, sneakers revolve on conveyer belts giving both an industrial and a museum-like feel. The oldest BAPE stores in Japan have already celebrated their first decade, but in Europe and the U.S., the brand has only recently started to gain a retail presence. In addition to Japan, BAPE stores exist in Hong Kong, Paris and London, and now two in the U.S.
The L.A. store was designed by Masamichi Katayama and his company Wonderwall. The 43-year-old Katayama is well known for retail work in Japan, France, U.K., the U.S., Russia, Hong Kong and China. - Tuija Seipell
April 2 2011
Bowling alleys are right up there with curling rinks on the list of the most unlikely milieus for anything chic. Yet, at The Spare Room, on the mezzanine level of the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, both bowling and the bowling oxfords custom-designed for the newly opened lounge by George Esquivel are now decidedly in.
Celebrities and notables are seen nightly at the venue, created by nightlife wizards Med Abrous and Marc Rose and cocktail king Aidan Demarest.
The design, by the Los Angeles-based design firm Studio Collective, combines vintage, custom-tailored and new to conjure up an atmosphere of by-gone affluence.
There is the gaming parlor vibe, with its two vintage bowling lanes and custom-made sets of dominoes. And there is the speakeasy cocktail lounge scene with its lavish use of velvet, dark leather, polished dark wood, bronze, cast-iron and hardwood floors. Together, they form The Spare Room that oozes civilized illegality and pays homage to the real goings-on at the storied hotel in the 1920s. Tuija Seipell
