With us tonight is mike presidency dio of the center for arts and culture. Prior to joining fort mason he was an nonprofit sf heritage in opened up the directors efficacy of the los angeles conservancy and the National Trust for Historic Preservation. We asked mike to moderate tonights program because his preservation work in los angeles is the subject of tonights talk in here in San Francisco. Thank you for being with us mike. Mike. Welcome and theyll hand the microphone over to you. Thank you so much frances. Such a pleasure to be here tonight with my two longtime friends and colleagues Ken Bernstein and Stephen Schafer to talk about their stunning new book preserving los angeles how preserving historical cities can transform americas cities published by angel city press. Dare i say this book is a monumentalda achievement in the preservation field. Ken has devoted his career h to enhancing the heritage of los angeles and when i joined in 2006 i had big shoes to fill. Ken had just left his role as director of preservation for the city and there it was in the Planning Department and its office of Historic Resources and urban dub design. Among his many responsibilities ken bled the sprawling l. A. Project. He documented Historic Resources across the citys 500 square miles not only the diversity. Its cultural communities. Anyone who knows los angeles can appreciate the size and scale of this massive undertaking. Steven schaefer describes himself as a photographer with a preservation distraction. He two decades behind the length of the camera to become a specialist in the photography of new and historic a architecture. He caught the preservation copped a preservation bug as it were after seemingly endless days of preservation to his 1881 victorian farmhouse. Ever since theyve been drawn to this buildings big and small and finds itself crisscrossing america documenting significant places for the National Register of Historic Places and historic email Building Survey collection at the library of congress. Let me handed over to ken and stephen for their presentation. There we go. Good evening everyone. Such a pleasure to be with alloo of you and the Historical Society to be able to speak with an audience throughout the state of california tonight and to share a little bit about preserving los angeles, our new book for angel city press. I really wanted to begin by talking a little bit about why we had this motivation what we are trying to do. I think most of you who follow the history of california in los angeles know there are many books on los angeles and its history and its architecture but i felt biggest story of presort ashbury Historic Preservation had not been told in a conference of way and thats what i wanted toat try to do wih preserving los angeles and let me quickly pull up my presentation. There it goes, okay. Preserving los angeles is meant to be the story of Historic Preservation of los angeles. I hadc felt that in their many books on los angeles architecture the power of preservation transforms communities has not been told and ive been frustrated in many cases the tears up in a claim that los angeles is a city that doesnt care about her history and doesnt care about historic architecture. Alle of you who are angelinos withu us tonight no certainly those are myths and their is a lot about theno heritage and wih this image of Universal StudiosLos Angeles Story is told has a mind of its own tonight its a story of some of the studios of los angeles and the entertainmenten industry could e the sum total of the history of los angeles and obviously thats not the case. Often i think the east coast reporter parachutes into the city and captures the essence of what l. A. Is all about. Ive been fortunate to be in professional vaults with the l. A. Conservancy and the city of los angeles and gotten a birdseye view for how Historic Preservation has been making a difference in communities around the city. I wanted to bring more interested in nuanced parts of los angeles that ive come to know and what i saw in los angeles is that Historic Preservation while its frequently mischaracterized about stopping change or preventing progress reservation has been aog primary engine for positive change throughout los angeles. Its been a tool that revitalizing our downtown, our historic downtown. Its been transforming neighborhoods in creating economic regeneration across her city and even helping to address thehe housing crisis in califora and los angeles. I wanted to try to bring that l. A. Preservation story to a larger audience so for angelinos who may not fully internalized all the positive changes that are around them or may not see them and to those beyond l. A. Who have misconceptions about what l. A. Is all about and i hope those of you joining us from the area dont have those negative perspectives. I hope as you start to get a closer look through the prism of Historic Preservationsm you stat to see much more interesting different city. This is what i wanted to do with the book and this is a side project for me. I call up my weekend project for the last two years. Ive been able to work on this with Stephen Schafer and i decided i want to donate my proceeds from the book to three National Organizations working for greater equity and inclusion in Historic Preservation. The africanamerican Heritage Action fund the National Trust of Historic Preservation they Historic Preservation and a tia Pacific IslanderHistoric Preservation. And they knew i wantedio this to be a visually rich book and am fortunate to find the perfect partner in t Steven Schaefer who we will be hearing from a little later and youll you will see in the photos i will be showing today. 300 images in the book. His unique eye for architectural detail and having a preservation as i think capturing the message i was trying to get across. I think that comes through as youll see the images i will be sharingom tonight. Again starting with ourst histoc downtown and Eastern Columbia Building and Architectural Buildings and historic theater business airy on broadway we are seeing developers and Property Owners alike tying preservation and adaptive conversion of Historic Buildings as economic value to their property and to project an angelinos are seeking out places like this as preferred places to live, work and play. I kind of book to provide example after example of how thats occurring throughout los angeles and to show how preservationist transform los angeles and how other cities with Historic Resources can use preservation as a tool to do much the same. For many writers reactive writing itself is a journey of discovery and finding your message and finding your character for a fiction fiction writer and it for me it wasnt about that. The story wanted to tell was based on my birdseye view of los angeles so for me it was about channeling the discoveries that was part of my work all along any infusing that into the book could have been very fortunatete too have an entree to remarkable Historic Places around the city that many angelinos. I wanted to take the reader along with me and say here, look at this. This is the real los angeles and one of those sites is the garden of oz. Its the firstge time i got to e this remarkable secret garden in the Hollywood Hills by a former journalist who worked with 75 of her artist brands including dietrich woods who began to involve it into her own home. Here you have a munchkin land as a tribute to the wizard of oz and tributes to peacemakers from the dalai lama and musicians and figures from Elvis Presley to duke ellington. She distributes the key to artist and to neighbors to be able to come in and experience the garden to offer to the general public and she was generous in allowing him to share with a wider audience and i wanted to share many of the hidden gems of the city with our readers in los angeles. This is a book and part about the practical lessons of Historic Preservation what we have two share and also to showcase it. We start the story with the power of historic designation that local Landmarks Program in los angeles we call a Historical Monument which are part of the local landmarks and we have over 1200 in theve city. The book showcases how many of these designations have led to dramatic transformations and rescues at the start places such as this are the idle hour one of the few remaining examples of whats called programmatic architecture in the form of the building reflected its use. This is a bar in North Hollywood in the form of a whiskey barrel that endures thanks to a historical designation. It became a flamenco dance theater, dinner theater in the 1970s and 80s and the dancer who operated the theater Florence Fernandez became the a woman who lived in a shoe except she was the a woman who lived in a whiskey barrel she grew old and apartment upstairs atat the bar with a small menagerie of animals around her. The building was curated and it was a historic f designation tht led to be the building came for auctionn a preservation minded buyer taking over in rehabilitating the bar and spending 2 million in preserving original features and reclaiming wood planks to the bar andar patio relocated. Another example of programmatic architecture an example of the 1928 bulldog cafe on washington boulevard in los angeles, a replica of the building in the automotive museum. In 1933 was relocated. We have two examples of programmatic architecture and Historical Monuments. L. A. Has also been a pioneer of preservation of cultural resources. We have one of the earliest Historic Preservation ordinances ahead of other california cities like San Francisco and san diego and allowing for the designation of local landmarks. Its always allowing for designation of places for social history. We call their landmark historic cultural monument and an example of that is the bar bar in silver lake. If any of you know about the stonewall riots in new york in 1959 and people saw that as the First Movement nationally. Actually the birth of that movement in many ways began at the cat new years day 1957. There was an lapd police raid on the bar melee and people were beaten by police just for expressing their enthusiasm for their love for one another. That led to protests at the site the following month and that led to action that went all the way to the u. S. Supreme court and the pioneering action for equal protection rights as part of the movement. Los angeles is a pioneer but a preservation pioneer and began to recognize places like this that may not have architectural significance. Social and culturall significane in addition to our definition of individual landmarks and monuments we also share here in los angeles the story of how preserve the entire neighborhoods or districts to the designation of Historic Preservation overlay zones which is another name for local districts in l. A. We have 35 of these in los angeles today and about 21,000 properties included in these neighborhoods. These designations have led to mass transformations in americas communities not only to share a handful of them in the book but i first wanted to speak to what makes las historic history unique. They are neighborhood thats very noted socioeconomic and demographic diversity for one. There were studies prepared by on the happen of the l. A. Conservancy last year that found los angeles has a higher share of fun and populations within the neighborhoods than average share of nonwhite populations in the city as a whole in los angeles. These are neighborhood that attracted very vibrant and diverse mixac of residents at al income levels as well read the example of that is the neighborhood shown here in t soh l. A. That is tremendously diverse and about 50 latino and 35 africanamerican and the historic designation has led to this neighborhood becoming even more closeknit and a truce sense of community in this area and reinvestment in many of the homes as well. Minnesota shows how droughttolerant landscaping can be inserted on the front lawn of the historic setting like this and still be very compatible with the historic character. All architectural styles and time periods in the citys history including the balboa islands historic overlay zone. This is the north end of their city San Fernando Valley in granadain hills. Many of the bay area citizens will note development with 10,000 homes in the bay area and this is their only in the city of los angeles and it brought modernism to the masses in 1964 and their youngest and as you can see landscaping and the cohesiveness of this modern neighborhood of the historicrh district. Our Historic Preservation generally have shown preservation and density are not mutually exclusive. This is a big topic is many of you whiting california right now as we are grappling with our housing prices and looking at introducingg transit and many neighborhoods. One thing that same preservation positive study that i cited found is there hbo v. s are denser and then the residential neighborhoods on average than the rest of city combined with surprises a love people. They are denser than the citywide boston and washington d. C. As an example. This is not a highrise neighborhood in terms of density but you can see a singlefamily home on the left the cottage in the middle and it triplex revival style and on the far end right and Apartment Buildings of different densities and you see many of our hbo thes this is the Lincoln Heights neighborhood one of our lower income neighborhoods that has a lot of multifamily homes. And our Historic District chose to density can be accommodated. I also in the book with all these beautiful photos that makes the book quite visually stunning that we have the reader get lost and in that i lose sight of the fact that preservation isnt only about ute and architecture but also about people. Its people who make Historic Preservation impossible possible and administrators of Historic Preservation and people who give life to the spaces we are talking about. It was important to me that we include those voices ine the bok through preservation profiles. I just showed the Lincoln Heights the driving force shown with a couple of his neighbors that made that all possible in this community. Kristin on the right who is a student at uc riverside in little tokyo Historical Society and put out a cultural Historic Mission foror the japanese hospital in and the Boyle Heights community in downtown l. A. Reallyea telling the story of fe japaneseamerican immigrants who created a Health Care Facility for their own community in the 1920s at the time when asianamericans were being denied health care and discrimination. Its a book that gives life to some of the stories and allow some of these individuals to tell their own stories in their own words through the book. I do want to point out while i have a fairly optimistic upbeat view of what we have been able to accomplish through Historic Preservation of los angeles i dont want to paint an entirely rosy picture. We have a lot of work to do and shortcoming in areas where we have come up short in many ways and one of those is in the arean of equity, diversity and inclusion and my own donation to the book is a recognition that we have fallen short in that area of los angeles. A disproportionate share of our designated cultural monuments in l. A. Are legacies of communities of color and 3 for africanamerican to the city and 6 for persons of color more generally. They do have newer designations in the last couple of years seeking to rectify some of that imbalance and one of them is the Temple Missionary Baptist Church onmi South Broadway in Southeast Los Angeles near the Watts Community and it was designated for the location of the recording of aretha franklinst Amazing Grace the bestselling gospel album of all time in 1972. And there was a film of sidney pollack that was only recently released a couple of years ago. Wes in los angeles have recenty launched an africanamerican histo