Sweeney Todd's Barbershop, Los Feliz CA

Every night as I drive home from work I pass an unassuming strip of Hollywood Blvd. that is quietly growing into one of the coolest little parts of LA. While these two or three blocks may often be passed over in favor of Los Feliz’s more established hipster heaven, Vermont Ave., around the corner there are a few shops that are worth a stop out of your way.

My favorite of the bunch is Sweeny Todd’s Barbershop. I know, I know. I’m a girl. I don’t need a barber. But my always-dapper partner in crime does, and I’m so jealous he has a place like this to go to get his hair(s) cut. In fact, he wishes his hair grew faster so he could go more than every other week! Sweeney Todd’s is a man’s barbershop. There are no $40 shampoos. There is no whiny hipster music playing on loop from sleek speakers above. No cell phones allowed. Just Todd and Danny in their white barber’s smocks and long scissors, snipping away while vintage tunes play in the background. There’s a rack of old Playboy magazines across from a glass case of curios—almost-rusty keychains, vintage combs, and other nicknacks. The walls are sparse with the exception of black and white headshots of famous leading men of yesteryear and a couple of aged posters advertising the “latest” in hair cut, care and style.

I’ve always wanted to photograph the shop so when I got the assignment to shoot “someone at work,” this was the only place I wanted to go. Todd was nice enough to let me crash the boys’ club for a little while and I had a great time talking to the various clients waiting for their turn in the chair. One gentleman, Mike, had been going to Danny for his haircuts for over 45 years!

If you’re a guy and you want a great haircut, go to Todd’s. Tell him I sent you!

Sweeny Todd’s Barbershop
4639 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90027

class act

hello, friendly blogland!

just wanted to give a short intro to the next couple posts i'll be adding. on a whim, i decided to take a documentary photography class. i love taking these kinds of classes because they challenge me both technically and creatively, and i feel like you can never, ever do too much learning. plus, i like that i can write everything off as 'education' come tax time! :)

this class is one of the best i've ever taken. our teacher, anthony friedkin is an incredible photographer who's done the kind of work i would love to do someday. honestly, the guy is an artist and journalist rolled into one, very enthusiastic fountain of knowledge. he grew up in california and is a peer of stacy peralta (writer/director of the amazing film dogtown and z boys) and does really stunning ocean photography. as a hawaii girl, seeing those pictures makes me feel like i'm a little closer to home. in addition, he's worked for magnum photos. if i could accomplish just one thing in my lifetime, i would love to work for magnum. not easy to do... but boy, wouldn't that be amazing!

anyway, i'm learning tons and will be posting the results from each assignment here so that they don't get lost in my ever-growing archives, never to see the light of day...

enjoy looking and i hope to hear what you think!

Simone

I'll be the first to say that I've had my fair share of weird roommate situations (including renting a room from a "massage therapist" in San Jose, though that's a whole blog entry unto itself.) However, I've also been lucky enough to meet some really amazing people like Simone Shin. Simone and I both rented a room in this funny little yellow house with a red door in South Pasadena. We bonded over the weirdness of our other roommate, who kept squirreled away in her room during the day and was a smelly food-eating, crazy club-going party animal at night. One of the first times I talked with Simone, we were discussing getting internet for the house. I was tired, so I looked around her room and found a chair to plop down in. And plop I did. See, Simone is an artist. And the chair was not really a chair, but a sculpture of a chair made out of cardboard and fabric. When I sat down, I crushed her sculpture. I felt TERRIBLE. I ruined ART! But Simone was gracious and made a joke and I knew then that I liked her more than any other roommate I'd had in recent history.

Even though I moved out of that house soon after Simone moved in, we've tried to keep in touch as much as our busy schedules will allow. I was so, so thrilled when, out of the blue, she contacted me last week because she'd been nominated for a prestigious illustration award and needed a photo to submit in case she was selected. I was like, OF COURSE! I mean, if anything else, it was a way to work off some of my destroyed-chair-sculpture karma. And, more importantly, it meant we'd finally meet up like we'd talking about for ages. Anyway, long story longer, we did the shoot, she won the award and we finally got to hang out. What more could I ask for?





If you have time, stop by Simone's website and blog. She's amazing!

holga

in the 1980's, the medium format holga toy camera was introduced as a way to bring affordable photography to the masses in mainland china. the camera body is made entirely of plastic, with only a little metal spring to open and close the shutter. over twenty-five years later, this little guy is still going strong with few-- if any-- changes to the original design. people love it for its ease of use and often unpredictable and surrealistic, dreamlike images. i bought my lil holga about three weeks ago because, though i love the instant gratification of digital, i was craving something less perfect and more tactile-- something i adore about film. with digital, you pretty much know what you're getting when you take the photo. with holga, it's a surprise. little light leaks in the plastic camera body create flashes of pink or orange on your film... the focus is guesswork, and even the exposure-- or double exposure-- is almost as much skill as it is plain luck. i'm hoping to get a little better at interpreting the simple-yet-oh-so-complicated settings (of which there are six: sunny or cloudy, and close, sort of close, far, or super-far) but here are a few that i liked from my very first roll:








probably the thing i love most about my holga is how light-weight it is (it's made of cheapy plastic, after all!) and i've been carrying it with me everywhere. i always feel a little off when i don't have a camera on me at all times, like the moment i don't have my camera, there'll be the shot of a lifetime-- and now i can feel secure that i won't miss a great picture without breaking my back. i still have lots to learn about holga's little quirks and i'll be sure to post my latest attempts here, for all to see! :)

left my heart (and luggage) in san francisco, pt. 2

I've had a few days to relax after my quick NorCal trip and am anxious to go back. Mostly because I'm hungry for Saha, but also because I am already tired of LA driving... again. Here's a sad thing: not only am I not-so-great at driving (more because of a lack of patience rather than lack of coordination), but I'm not-so-great at public transit, too. Even though I used to live in the Bay Area, I never really took BART and I failed royally at it last weekend.

To get from Palo Alto to Berkeley without a car, you either have to be super in-shape to walk and swim the 40 miles across the bay, or you need to take the CalTrain and BART. I, being the ever-so-savvy Hawaii girl-turned Angeleno, felt the latter was the easier, hipper, and certainly more metropolitan choice. After a nice lunch with a friend in Palo Alto, I hopped on the CalTrain towards Millbrae. Not so tough, right? Wrong. Imagine me, wrangling a gigantic backpack (turtle girl!!) a gigantic purse, and a gigantic carry-on through the teeny upper-level aisles of the train. As I finally made it to a chair and squished in with my three large bags, I wondered if anyone could see me hiding beneath them. At the Millbrae stop, I hopped off and bought my BART ticket. But, there were no signs directing me which train to take to get to Berkeley. I hopped on the sole train there, figuring it would eventually take me where I needed to go. Map says Dublin/Pleasanton train to Richmond train which stops at Ashby... Cool. I'm on the right track, I've got it figured out. As the train started pulling out of the stop, a voice crackled over the loudspeaker. "This train going to San Francisco. Next stop is your transfer to the Richmond Train to East Bay." Wait, what? I thought that was at least four stops from here! No sooner had I decided the conductor was probably right, the train pulled into the next stop. Ok! Grab your backpack, catch the next train, let's go! As I sprinted up the stairs looking for the other platform (wait! there's no other platform??) I realized that my bags weren't nearly as heavy. I only had one of them. QUICK! I ran back down to the platform, right in time to see the train-- and my luggage-- disappear into the tunnel towards San Francisco.

Needless to say, I was freaking out. I searched frantically for a BART employee, but no one was to be found. No one, that is, until I found Maria. I could barely see her behind the large swivel chair and pulled-low-over-her-eyes hat in the info booth. As she turned around to acknowledge me, I could tell I was in good hands. "Bags…on train…my luggage…everything!" The words came tumbling out as I motioned with my arm towards San Francisco. "My bags are on the train that just left!" She calmed me down, checked the schedule, and phoned to the next stop. After a couple minutes, we got the call back that when the train arrived at the next station they would go down and have someone search it to see if they could find my bag. After what seemed like hours, the phone rang again. They had it! All I had to do was get on the next train to Daly City and pick it up. Maria walked me down to the platform, and when the next train arrived, the conductor, Mike, leaned out of the window. Maria explained everything to Mike, and together they promised I’d finally get to where I was going—with all my bags, too.

At Daly City, I got off the train and met up with Andrea, who searched the train and saved my bag from its unaccompanied trip to San Francisco. Maria, Mike and Andrea, if you are reading this— a big hug and THANK YOU!! Your kindness truly made my trip memorable.

My heroes:



So, after all of that, you’d think I’d have a smooth trip to Berkeley, right? Almost. I texted my friend Adrianne to let her know why I was delayed, and she said just to get off the BART, she’d meet me at Civic Center in SF. That sounded good to me—I was a bit overwhelmed by BART at that point. But then—of course—I didn’t realize Civic Center was the next stop. As I rushed to exit the train (with all my bags, thank goodness,) it dawned on me that Civic Center was probably not where I wanted to wait. Strip clubs and liquor stores lined Market Street, and there didn’t seem to be any place for me to sit that wasn’t intruding on someone’s “home.” I could feel eyes following me and my three gigantic bags as I walked through the open courtyard and decided, very quickly, that I’d just get take the train to Berkeley—it would be safer than waiting. Back on the train, I was relieved but also incredulous that it could take me almost four hours to get forty miles. I might have done better walking!

The rest of the trip went by much too quickly. Burgers and beer at Raleigh's, thrift-store shopping, and drinks and a game of Pictionary at Albatross. A fun night, and I wish I could have stayed longer. Next time I’m in the area, I’m going to go to a show at 924 Gilman Street, the legendary East Bay punk rock venue. Green Day played there before they “sold out,” and so have my favorites Fugazi, Rancid, Bad Religion, The Dead Kennedys… *sigh*. I heart punk rock!


Here’s Adrianne outside Rasputin Music:




And some pretty cherry blossoms in Palo Alto:

left my heart (and luggage) in san francisco, pt. 1

Oh, what a month it's been! My normally homebody self has been up and down the state this past month and I find that I'm again playing catch up.

My dad was in town for a conference two weeks ago, and when that was over we drove four hours north to San Luis Obispo to visit my aunt and 90-year-old grandmother. This is technically a photography blog so I'll spare you the essay I could write on what I observed to be a surprisingly warm and rewarding experience of caring for a parent as they age. But, I'll say this: while it's difficult to see someone you love change and need more and more care, I was so touched by the relationship I witnessed between my aunt and grandma. She has little to no memory, but she is happy. She laughs, she jokes, she doesn't take herself too seriously (in fact, one of the funniest things to her is that she is, indeed, 90 years old.) Though she sleeps most of the day, she is never alone and whenever she wakes there is someone who loves her there waiting. It's scary, to think of our parents aging; our role models we know to be strong and steady becoming weak and frail. But what a gift, to be able to care for them as they've cared for us... I've always wondered how I could ever express to my parents how grateful I am for the love, life and opportunities they've given me. I hope one day (a very, very long time from now) I'll be able to show them the same love and care as they did for me when I was just a messy, screaming, rugrat of a child.

Anyway, enough of the serious stuff! Here is a photo of my parents, who are so obviously still in love. How cute!




Not a week after my dad left, I got on a plane to San Francisco to visit my sister Melissa for her 23rd birthday and see several of my closest friends. Melissa and her boyfriend Nate picked me up at SFO and we went straight into the city for a late dinner. Let me just say that I have a new favorite restaurant, and it deserves it's own line:

Saha, SF

It's the most amazing food EVER, and I love food. I was a bit skeptical based on my preliminary research, but know this-- the website does not do it justice. It's so good, in fact, that I couldn't even share more than a bite (one bite!) with my sister...ON HER BIRTHDAY. That's saying something. (I hopefully made up for my gluttonous ways with the birthday candle-topped choco-pear, but still the guilt persists...) The Yemenese/Arabic-fusion was subtle and delightful, the decor was rich and inviting and vibrantly exotic. I have only two complaints-- one, that my stomach was not large enough for another three courses, and two, that my favorite restaurant is 300 miles away. Dear Chef Aboghanem, can you please open a Los Angeles location? I promise I'll visit every night until my piggy bank falls empty to the floor!

I took a couple pictures of Saha, but they were on my new (and already beloved) chunk-of-plastic Holga camera, which uses only film (ah, the good old days...) I should have the proofs back in a day or two, so I'll scan them and post them then. In the meantime, here are some shots I did a few weeks ago of Aman Alem, an actor and very talented young musician. LA folks-- extra points if you can spot the locations!









Stay tuned for more on my trip to SF, including the heart-wrenching story of how I almost lost my luggage! (Well, maybe not heart-wrenching to you, but for me... it was a doozy!)

Keiki Time!

In Hawaiian, keiki means "little one." I've been dying to do a shoot with a little itty bitty baby, and last week I had the chance to take some photos of 5 month-old Oona and her mom, Arianne. As you'll see from the pictures below, I'm not exaggerating when I say that this keiki is about as cute as they come. One thing I loved about photographing Oona-- her name means "unity," by the way-- is it reminded me how simple the world used to be. Remember that? When there was nothing more to do than be cuddled, eat, play with pets and toys and your own little toes, cuddle some more... sleep.... *sigh* What a life we all once had!

Oona and her parents live in a beautiful house up in the hills, with an open-beam ceiling and tons of light. For a while, I was really, really into interior design and Arianne and her husband David's house was just my style! Modern, with earthy touches like unfinished open beams, and a slate/ rock wall that reaches to the tip-top of the tall ceiling. Low, modern couches and floor-to-ceiling windows... *swoon!* It's an absolutely gorgeous house to hold an absolutely gorgeous family. Eventually I would like to learn a little more about architectural photography, but for now I'm perfectly happy to spend my time taking people-pictures, and am hoping to do another keiki shoot soon! (Probably because try as I might, I just can't get away with sleeping and cuddling and playing with my own toes all day... and if I can live vicariously through a cute lil' one while taking pictures, I'll take it!)









Even the dogs in this family are adorable!