The first competition held at the Maggie Gilbert Aquatics Center was a Southern California-sanctioned swim meet hosted by Westside Aquatics on Saturday and Sunday. More than 650 athletes, ages 5 to 19, came from as far away as Pasadena and Torrance to swim in the new 10-lane competition pool on the Palisades High campus, which was dedicated on October 10. There were so many entries that swimmers did ‘fly-over starts’, which saves time by having swimmers who finish their heat stay in the pool until the next race starts.
Palisades-Malibu YMCA Executive Director Carol Pfannkuche shares the results of a survey that examined the needs of local middle school youth with 37 community leaders on Tuesday at Aldersgate Retreat. Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
Members of the Palisades-Malibu YMCA spent the past six months conducting a research study to determine the needs of middle school youth living in Pacific Palisades.   ’Our desire is to strengthen our community, and we realized that having some data specific to our youth would help us target our efforts toward their needs,’ Y Executive Director Carol Pfannkuche told the Palisadian-Post.   On Tuesday, Pfannkuche presented the results of the study to 37 Palisades community leaders at the Aldersgate Retreat & Cultural Center on Haverford Avenue.   The Y’s Healthy Families Council, a group of 30 local moms that formed a year ago with the goal of developing programs for toddlers to teens, initiated the study.   The Y hired Search Institute, an independent nonprofit organization that is committed to helping create healthy communities for young people, to conduct the survey of more than 2,000 sixth, seventh and eighth graders attending Calvary Christian School, Corpus Christi Catholic School, Paul Revere Charter Middle School and St. Matthew’s Episcopal School.   The study was funded by Kevin and Annie Barnes, Meredith Rowley (representing the Jessie Barker McKellar Foundation) and Marvin Hoffenberg, (representing the Sidney Stern Memorial Trust). Rowley and Annie Barnes are members of the Healthy Families Council.   The middle school students answered 58 questions about how they perceived themselves, their families, friends, neighborhood, school and community.   The Y discovered that young people do not think their neighbors care about them or adults in their community value them. The survey also showed that there is a need for more community service activities. The youth reported that they do not spend an hour or more per week serving the community.   Youth indicated that they are motivated by their friends and interested in environmental issues, sports and technology. However, they are not reading for pleasure, and they do not feel talented/skilled in construction. They described themselves as happy, upbeat, energetic, caring for others, relaxed and easy-going.   The Healthy Families Council, co-chaired by Laura Chung and Colleen Buerge, now plans to create programs around the results. The Council would like to start mentorship programs to create a positive connection between local adults and youth. The moms also want to provide more community service opportunities and find ways to encourage reading.    ‘A lot of kids love soccer, so maybe we could start a book club of kids reading books about soccer,’ Pfannkuche said. In addition to the Search Institute’s survey, the Y staff, board members and volunteers also interviewed community leaders and families. From those interviews and focus groups, they discovered that families are spending more time in individualized sedentary activities.   Pfannkuche said a lot of families reported that they don’t have enough time to spend together because they are busy commuting around the city, taking their children to sports practices and dance lessons.   ’We would like to have a facility, where we can provide all those programs,’ Pfannkuche told the Post. ‘We are still working on a strategic plan for our YMCA facility.’   Pfannkuche noted that the current space on Via de la Paz is not large enough to house such activities. The Y agreed not to build on the four-acre Simon Meadow property (located on the corner of Temescal Canyon Road and Sunset Boulevard) for 10 years, when the organization purchased the property from the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy in October 2007.   ’It’s a long complicated process,’ Pfannkuche said of the possibility of building a facility on the Simon Meadow property. ‘The right location could be there or somewhere else in the Palisades.’
Pacific Palisades residents Neal and Linda Vitale are selling their Tudor Revival-style home, located at 780 Amalfi Drive, for $5.7 million. The home, constructed in 1935, was one of the first built in the Riviera neighborhood. Photo Courtesy of Unlimited Style Real Estate Photography
In 1935, Albert Sweny commissioned the construction of a Tudor Revival-style home in the Riviera neighborhood for $10,600. Now, that same house, expanded and remodeled, is on the market for $5.7 million. Pacific Palisades residents Neal and Linda Vitale are selling their 7,014-sq.-ft. historic home, located at 780 Amalfi Dr., after living there for 12 years. Vitale is the founder of 1105 Media, which publishes Campus Technology, Redmond magazine, Recharger and Federal Computer Week. ’The architectural integrity of the house has been preserved throughout the years,’ said Brenda Chandler Cooke of Hilton & Hyland in Beverly Hills, who is sharing the listing with Mary Ann Musico of Sotheby’s International Reality in Beverly Hills. Interested in the home’s history, Vitale hired building biographer Tim Gregory, who has completed more than 2,000 property histories for homeowners and real estate firms. Gregory reported that the house was one of the first to be built in the Riviera neighborhood above Sunset (which stretches from Amalfi Drive to San Remo/Monaco Drives). Sweny, who lived off his father’s fortune from the lumber industry, hired architect Percy Parke Lewis to design the 3,731-sq.-ft. home for himself and his wife, Isabel. Lewis is most well known for designing the Fox Westwood Village Theatre, located at 961 Broxton Ave. The theater was constructed in 1931, and its tower, with Art Deco metal patterns, is a local landmark. He also designed the Twenty-Eighth Church of Christ, Scientist at the corner of Hilgard and Lindbrook in 1934 and St. Alban’s Episcopal Church at the northeast corner of South Hilgard and Westholme Avenue in 1940. ’Sweny wanted a Tudor Revival-style home because it was a sign of affluence,’ Cooke said. Popular in the early 20th century, Tudor Revival was inspired by late medieval English homes, ranging from thatched-roof folk cottages to grand manor houses. The Tudor characteristics on Sweny’s house, with its subsequent additions, include a steeply pitched roof, gables, a half-timbered second story and a first story of brick and stone. The main entry is also recessed, and the house features casement windows. Sweny and Isabel lived in the home until May 1944, when they sold it to Kenneth A. and Maude T. Murray. After the Murrays died, the property was sold in 1973 to William C. and Marilyn Doran, who later sold the house to Brad and Jill Gray in January 1988. Brad, then a prominent talent manager, is now the CEO of Paramount Pictures. The house was virtually unchanged until the Grays purchased it. They altered the kitchen, added a maid’s room, a bathroom and laundry, extended the family room, enlarged the garage and constructed a second floor above the garage (with a bedroom, two baths, a sauna, family room, loft and workout room). They also installed a swimming pool and spa. The Vitales purchased the house, with five bedrooms and six and a half baths, in 1998, and they hired interior designer Janet Lohman to make the space more colorful. Lohman used a color palette of robin’s egg blue, apple green and buttery yellow throughout the house. ’The new owners have made the house bright and cheerful,’ Cooke said. ‘It translates to a wonderful California home.’ The Vitales chose to leave untouched the mahogany library, with its built-in bookshelves and fireplace, but they lightened the oak walls in the dining room. They transformed the living room into a dynamic space with apple-green walls accented by white built-in bookshelves. They made the master bedroom, with two bay windows and a fireplace, feel warmer by painting the walls a light yellow. The Vitales also redid the family room above the garage, which the Grays had added onto the house. The room originally had a log-cabin feel, but the Vitales painted the log walls white and the windowpanes blue. They also made their 21-by-29-ft. kitchen more vibrant, and their changes were featured in Better Homes and Gardens’ Kitchen and Bath Ideas magazine in January/February 2004, The kitchen has light green and white-checkered floors and buttery yellow walls. The blue and green cupboards and drawers have a distressed finish, giving them a worn look. As an accent, four kitchen drawers feature glass panels at the front, showcasing macaroni, black-eyed peas, yellow lentils and baby white beans. The spacious kitchen, with a butler’s pantry, also has a sitting area and patio doors that open out to the backyard. The Vitales hired Diana Green to redo the backyard’s landscaping to include a knot garden, a white picket fence with rose bushes and a stone pool deck. They added a gazebo next to the house and a grassy area and playhouse for their daughter Marissa. ’The house really has a vintage, historic look,’ Musico said, adding that it truly is a traditional family home. Contact: Musico at (310) 786-1822 or Cooke at (323) 939-1112.
At the latest PCH Task Force meeting in Santa Monica on October 27, Pacific Palisades resident Stuart Muller displayed numerous photographs of K-rail, steel beams and concrete blocks. Muller wanted to know why, after his numerous complaints to Caltrans and city officials, the items had not been removed from along the highway below Castellemmare and between Temescal and Potrero Canyons. Marvin Pruitt, Caltrans Superintendent for Area II, told the assembled group, which included State Senator Fran Pavley and Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, that he had cleaned up the yard at Castellemmare.   Muller pointed to the photographs he had taken of steel beams.   ’Everything we could move, we moved,’ Pruitt responded. ‘Everything that’s left [steel I-beams] will have to stay because there’s no place to store it.’   Pruitt continued, ‘If you drive northbound on PCH between Chautauqua Boulevard and Las Flores Canyon, you’ll notice different barrier walls in place. At each of those locations there have been rockslides and mudslides over the years. It’s a protective wall for motorists, pedestrians, bicyclists and homeowners on the beach side of PCH.’   Pruitt noted that after the previous PCH Task Force meeting in January, L.A. County had offered Caltrans space in its yard off Topanga Canyon Road to store some of the K-rail now at Temescal and Potrero.   ’One K-rail section weighs 10 tons because it’s built with concrete and has rebar,’ Pruitt said. ‘A loader is being brought to Potrero and a second loader to the county yard and some K-rail will be transported to the site in three to four weeks, but not all will be transported.   ’K-rail is placed along PCH for the same reason [as barrier walls]. With emergency construction materials close by, all we have to do is get the proper equipment there to start placing it where needed. None of us can predict when heavy rains may come, or a slide may occur, but we do know from past experience that emergency lane/road closures are common along PCH.’   Muller asked that the remaining construction debris located between Temescal and Potrero be removed. Pruitt said Caltrans was only responsible for the K-rail and a pile of sand and a pile of base material, but that the rest, including a water tank and a shed, belonged to the City of Los Angeles. According to Councilman Bill Rosendahl’s senior deputy Norm Kulla, the shack and water tank removal will be part of renewed infill-construction work in Potrero Canyon, which might begin early in 2011. ‘I can’t guarantee or confirm timing; timing for all construction projects has been a moving target in my experience in government,’ Kulla told the Palisadian-Post. ‘We’ve requested the shack and water tank removal be included for the restart of the Potrero project. We are working with other departments to see if we can get these items removed earlier, but nothing has been finalized.’   In other action at the Task Force meeting, Kendrick Okuda, program manager for the Bureau of Engineering’s Proposition O bond program, said the city is finalizing a construction schedule for the 4,500-foot Coastal Interceptor Relief Sewer (CIRS), which will take year-round dry weather runoff to the Hyperion Wastewater Treatment Plant rather than allowing it flow into Santa Monica Bay.”   Work is expected to begin at the beach parking lots (near the Annenberg Beach Club) before the end of the year, but PCH southbound traffic will not be affected until 2011.’The timeline for lane closures has not been completed, but work is expected to continue through fall 2012, and extend north to the Will Rogers State Beach parking lot near the L.A. County Lifeguard headquarters.   Okuda said that the public will be informed of lane closures through road signs, via the press, on Twitter: @PCHPartners and on the PCH Partners Web site: www.pchpartners.org.’He is scheduled to brief the Pacific Palisades Community Council at its meeting on Thursday evening, November 18.
Students who are in the top five percent of nationally normed, standardized tests are invited to take an additional test through the Center for Talented Youth, a nonprofit located at Johns Hopkins University. Seventh and eighth graders take the ACT’the same tests used for college admissions. Second through sixth graders take the SCAT, an above-level test scaled for younger students. This year’s highest-scoring students, who receive a certificate, included 34 Pacific Palisades private- and public-school students, who were honored at an awards luncheon at Loyola Marymount University on October 16. Seventh and eighth graders honored included Jacquelyn Klein (Archer School), Christina Wadsworth (Harvard-Westlake), Spencer Adams-Rand (Brentwood Middle School), Henry Algert (St. Matthew’s) and Zorawar Dhandwar and Ellie Sun (Paul Revere Middle School). Students who scored high on the SCAT were Jonathan Damico (Brentwood Lower School); Jack Brew, Luke Holscher, Cate Hathaway, Nicole Smith, Micaela Cole and Preston Cole (Calvary Christian); Jakob Amster and Caitlin Baskin (Carlthorp); Delaney Arth, Michaela Keefe, Adam Snyder and Samuel Marguleas (Corpus Christi); Brett Anwar, Jared Anwar, Ryan Patton and Alexander Smith (Marquez Elementary); Henry Zumbrunnen (Mirman); Harry Garvey (PS #1); Nicholas Kerkorian and Luke Schneider (Palisades Elementary); Ryan Albert, Nicholas Witham, Natalie Wiegand and Kenton Sheridan (St. Matthew’s); Paul Anderson (Seven Arrows); Agustin Letelier (UCLA Lab School); and Zachary Robertson (Village School). Visit: www.cty.jhu.edu.
Edith Barbara Grant, a Pacific Palisades resident since 1960, passed away on November 3 at the age of 85. This amazing lady died from an aortic aneurysm at Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach. Born June 14, 1925, Edie was a graduate of Los Angeles High School and UCLA, where she was a member of the Pi Beta Phi sorority. She did much charity work, including involvement with the Assistance League, National Charity League, Childrens Hospital and St. John’s Hospital. She was also a lifelong tennis player who played for many years at Riviera Tennis Club in Pacific Palisades and Big Canyon Country Club in Newport Beach. Edie was a loving mother and wife of 58 years to her husband Perry, a television writer and producer. He died in 2004. She is survived by her daughter Cheryl Niese (husband Gary), her son Rick (wife Hattie) and granddaughter Rebecca. ‘ A memorial service was held on November 9 at Corpus Christi Church in Pacific Palisades. In lieu of flowers,’memorial donations to support the Westside Challenge to Beat Breast Cancer Tennis Tournament can be made to the UCLA Foundation:’UCLA Medical Sciences Development,’10945 Le Conte Ave., Suite 3132, Los Angeles, CA 90095, Attn: Becky Mancuso-Winding.
Carrie Francis Sears, a resident of Pacific Palisades since 2002, died at age 53 on October 29. Carrie had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer in May 2009. After much treatment, chemotherapy and radiation and clinical trials, she died suddenly, and unexpectedly, of acute cardiac arrest. Before that she had perhaps only two weeks of the kind of suffering one expects of terminal cancer, for which the family is profoundly grateful. Born November 9, 1956, Carrie never knew her birth parents, but her adoptive parents were the film industry agent Milton Pickman and the actress Kay Buckley. She grew up in West Los Angeles, and graduated from Beverly Hills High School in 1974. She received a degree in psychology from UCLA in 1978. There she met Palisadian David O. Sears, a professor of social psychology at UCLA. She later received an MBA from USC. Carrie moved to New York in the early 1980’s, and worked for two decades as a highly successful trader of convertible bonds. She married Jim Powers, living in Connecticut and later New Orleans and Woodlands, Texas with him. They had two children, Patrick J. Powers III, currently a student at Santa Monica College, and Annabelle Powers, now in the 11th grade here at Westview School. She moved back to California in 2002 to be with David, and they were married in a romantic wedding on the beach at Point Dume in 2004. By that time she was already suffering from multiple myeloma. She retired from her bond-trading business and developed many friends in the area, as well as creating beautiful gardens around their residence in Marquez Knolls, while inching her somewhat recalcitrant husband into some badly needed, and actually quite beautiful, home improvements. Carrie is survived by her children, her brother Charles and his family, and David’s daughters Juliet, Olivia and Meredith, and their families. She was an exceptionally warm, kind, compassionate, generous, intelligent and fundamentally decent human being. She loved her dogs beyond all reason, and was a committed Democrat.
200 Toyopa Photo by Rich Schmitt, Staff Photographer
The Pacific Palisades Junior Women’s Club (PPJWC) will showcase three homes with memorable features that range from Asian textiles and a home-spa to French provincial details on the 25th annual Holiday Home Tour. Local florists and designers have decorated all three homes. The self-guided event takes place this Sunday November 14, from 11a.m to 4 p.m. Tickets are $40 per person, $25 for seniors over age 60. Visit www.ppjwc.com or go to the Holiday Boutique the day of the tour, located at the Palisades Recreation Center, 851 Alma Real. The boutique will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and feature gift items by 30 local artisans and craftsmen, with house wares, clothing, jewelry and specialty foods among the offerings. All the proceeds from ticket sales will be donated to nonprofit groups in the Palisades. Through the years, the PPJWC has made substantial contributions to local public schools, the Palisades Recreation Center, the branch library, the Palisades-Malibu YMCA and many other organizations.
CUMBRE ALTA
The iron gate at the street opens onto a long, winding driveway that brings an air of mystery and romance to this Mediterranean-inspired property in the Highlands. The house was recently remodeled to include all the amenities of a five-star hotel, with travertine floors, a day spa in the master bathroom and a gym with fitness equipment as well as an entertainment system. Views from the second floor take in miles of ocean, ships and sailboats, as well as Catalina Island. The owners make full use of indoor-outdoor living. The dining room French doors open onto a patio. An outdoor living room features its own fireplace. The back yard is a tropical garden with an ‘infinity’ pool, gazebo and outdoor shower and changing room. Home is a luxury hotel.
767 VIA DE LA PAZ
A fa’ade of golden ochre with pale green shutters, a rose trellis arching over the walkway and a black metal table and chairs on a terrace suggest a gracious Mediterranean home. Inside, oversize crown moldings accentuate the proportions of the rooms. Wide-plank wooden flooring and wrought-iron lighting fixtures add a proven’al feeling. In the kitchen, copper pots add to the homey d’cor, with a tile design inspired by a patchwork quilt. Beside the kitchen, a family room features a fireplace of river rock set in concrete with a wood-beam mantle. Intimate furnishings throughout add to the Old World charm.
200 TOYOPA
The exterior of this house on the Huntington Palisades bluff is pale grey stone that relates to the shimmer of the ocean in the background. Inside, the d’cor calls to mind travels of sea captains who return home with treasures from around the world. Art works from India, textiles from Turkey and Greece and a window valance that incorporates an antique Sri Lankan woodcarving capture the homeowners’ love of artisanal work from distant places. A second-floor family room features walls painted with scenes of a terraced garden under a night sky, inspired by views from an Indian palace. A striped dhurrie rug completes the mood. Other special features include a silver-leaf ceiling in the dining room and lush potted trees that bring the outdoors inside.
Cassandra Ristaino sings “More” in the Theatre Palisades Stephen Sondheim musical review. Photo: Joy Daunis
Theatre Palisades staging of the Stephen Sondheim musical review ‘Putting it Together,’ which opened at Theatre Palisades last Friday is delightful. Although some of the voices are uneven, there is much to commend this show, which plays weekends through December 12 at Pierson Playhouse. The imaginative set, designed by Sherman Wayne, places the grand piano on stage, with the twinkling skyline of Manhattan behind it, which means we can appreciate the talents of pianist Chip Colvin and Dave Volpe on keyboards. Musicians are generally the unseen heroes of all musicals, and it was nice to have them subtly spotlighted. Catherine Rahm, who has done an outstanding job of directing the review admits in her notes that she has performed in numerous Sondheim musicals, including ‘Company,’ ‘Into the Woods’ and ‘Sweeney Todd.’ She feels that this particular show offers a chance for those unfamiliar with Sondheim to hear his lyrics, which are witty and tell a story. To those who love Sondheim’s music and remember classics like ‘Send in the Clowns,’ ‘Anyone Can Whistle’ and ‘Losing My Mind,’ this review also offers songs that aren’t heard as often. When this review played in New York and then Los Angeles, one of my favorite songs, ‘The Ladies Who Lunch,’ was in the show. Theatre Palisades has substituted that song with ‘Could I Leave You,’ as well as expanding the cast to six players rather than five. Cassandra Ristaino, who is making her Theatre Palisades debut, plays the younger woman and does it with aplomb. Her voice dances over the music with ease, and she may be the one of the main reasons to go to the show. What a lovely voice’her presence is reminiscent of a young Bernadette Peters. When she sings ‘Sooner or Later,’ from the movie Dick Tracy, which garnered Sondheim an Oscar for best song, the audience is entirely beguiled. Patty Reid returns to TP after taking time off to be a full-time mom. Her role was added, and one wishes that she could have had more solos, because her voice is one I would’ve liked to listen to more. Stephen Sondheim, who celebrated his 80th birthday in March, received an all-star birthday concert at Lincoln Center (which is scheduled to air on PBS on November 24). He has completed a new book ‘Finishing the Hat’ and was interviewed by KCRW-FM’s ‘Bookworm’ host Michael Silverblatt on Monday at UCLA Royce Hall. Sondheim has written lyrics for ‘West Side Story’ and ‘A Little Night Music,’ and music and lyrics for ‘A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,’ and a ‘Sunday in the Park with George.’ Songs from all of those shows are woven into ‘Putting it Together,’ which features an older married couple, a younger man and woman, and a maid and butler. The songs in the review explore the complexities of love, life and relationships, through a keen adult eye. In a interview with the Telegraph, Sondheim said, ‘[William] Faulkner said there are three things a writer needs: experience, observation and imagination. I’ve always simplified it, that you can do without one of them, but you can’t do without two. I don’t have an awful lot of experience, but I’ve got a lot of observation and imagination.’ Sondheim has shaped American musicals for the last 50 years and Theatre Palisades offers residents a chance to hear some of the songs that have had lasting impact on the musical scene. Call: (310) 454-1970 or visit: www.theatrepalisades.org.
An exhibition of portraits by Don Bachardy will be shown for the first time at g169 gallery, with an opening reception on Saturday, November 13 from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Santa Monica Canyon gallery, 169 W. Channel Rd. in Santa Monica Canyon. Known for his extraordinary deft, fluid and graphically concise style, Bachardy has rendered such figures as Aldous Huxley, Ana’s Nin and Dorothy Parker, as well as the official portrait of Governor Jerry Brown (the first time), which hangs in the State Capitol. Commenting on his approach to portraiture, Bachardy said, ‘I have obeyed my early, instinctive urge to complete each work I do in a single sitting. The departure of my sitter is like the breaking of a spell. I never alter any detail of the work I’ve done once the sitting has ended.’ A Santa Monica Canyon resident, Bachardy met his lifetime partner, author Christopher Isherwood, in 1953 and remained with him until Isherwood’s death in 1986. In 2005, Bachardy was given a retrospective exhibition of his portraits at the Huntington Library, which owns the complete archives of Isherwood. Most recently, Bachardy made a cameo appearance in the movie based on Isherwood’s book ‘A Single Man.’ In a 2009 interview with Angeleno Magazine, Bachardy said ‘Chris got the idea for that book when he and I were having a domestic crisis. We’d been together 10 years. I was making a lot of trouble and wondering if I shouldn’t be on my own. Chris was going through a very difficult period as well. So he killed off my character, Jim, in the book and imagined what his life would be without me.’ Bachardy still lives in Isherwood’s canyon home, where he paints portraits for gallery shows and on a commission basis. Complimentary valet service and refreshments will be served at the g169 reception.
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