Garment District Touring

After the Los Angeles Flower District tour, I headed over to the "Blue Schedule" tour of the Garment District.

The LA Garment District is called the Fashion District, actually. You can take the girl out of New York...

LA Conservancy offers great walking tours throughout the year, mostly in DTLA. But once a year, they cook up something special. Last year was the Koreatown one, and the year before that, I took their Chinatown walking tour. I've been in Los Angeles now for 3.5 years, and I figure I'll stay until I'm out of new things to check out, or until MariesWorldTour 2021 happens.

The Blue Schedule (including three walking tours) started at Santee Court at 10:30 a.m., so I strolled over slowly. I passed a sewing supply shop—hey, I need a zipper foot for my sewing machine! They had hundreds of zipper feet for all kinds of machines, but I don't actually know what my used machine is, in spite of digging around a lot online. There's no brand  marked on it. But I know where the zipper foot store is, and next time I head to that part of the world, I can take a machine foot along for them to match.

Downtown is a mixture of trendy apartments, expensive restaurants, repurposed lofts, Skid Row, wholesale bong shops, and completely different versions of "living on the edge." I could get from the Fashion District to Las Vegas or Tijuana for about twenty bucks on a discount bus. In the spirit of the moment, I went into a bodega and bought a lottery ticket. I didn't know how to do this, so I had to ask the proprieter what I was supposed to do. He had the machine do it for me.

The meeting point at Santee Court consists of old factories renovated into New York-style apartments. Sort of. More like a Disneyland version of New York. There are a few of these high-end lofts floating around in, I dunno, Dumbo, I guess. We were able to go inside one, and also over to some nearby repurposed lofts. I'd love to live downtown in one of these. My favorite would be on 4th and Main where I was when I first hit town, by the Red Line. But getting to work was a hassle. Hollywood, Burbank, and Los Feliz are much easier for getting to my office.

The second tour was of the California Market Center, the New Mart, and the Cooper Design Space, which includes offices for companies like AG and 7 For All Mankind. Of course, none of these were open on weekends, but last Friday of the month, you can go to sample sales in all these buildings. I went to a special sale in California Market Center a few years ago—I got things for five dollars each!

By the time the third tour started, I was really dragging in the 87 degree heat. I ditched early and hopped on the DASH bus back to the Red Line. The day was long but I love these kind of things.

I've uploaded photos here.