Then And Now

We here at #IheartHollywood  ❤️  Hollywood history,  and there is no better way to see how far we have come then by looking back.  Here are some amazing before and after pics.

Then And Now:  Sunset Plaza:

Top: This is the famous Trocadero at 8610 Sunset Blvd. from Sunset Plaza drive, in a photo taken after 1944. The bottom pic is how it looks today.  Fun fact: The building to left with the columns was used as the establishing shot of Charlie Townsend Agency in the pilot episode of Charlies Angeles.

Then And Now:  Wallace Reid House and The Standard Hotel at Sunset and Sweetzer:

The top pic is the back of Wallace and Dorothy Reid’s home at 8327 DeLongpre Ave. as it would have appeared from a tour bus on the Sunset Strip. The house was built in 1920 as part of the Hacienda Park development. The bottom pic is how it looks today.   The house was torn down by the 1960s and replaced with the Thunderbird Motel, which billed itself as “the first motel on the Sunset Strip.” It’s the Standard Hotel today.

Then And Now:  The 8300 Block Of The Sunset Strip Looking West:

Both these photos were taken around Sweetzer Avenue and Sunset on the Strip looking west. The Art Deco tower to the left in both shots is the Sunset Tower, which was completed in 1931. 

The top photo dates to the mid-1930s because we know that the Sunset Strip was not paved until then, probably as part of the Depression-era Works Project Administration. Prior to that, the Strip had been a graveled road, first graded in 1906 and probably sprayed with an asphalt-like substance that helped keep dust down, but which did nothing to prevent the road from rutting out in winter rainstorms.

The roadway was covered in concrete in the 1930s, which remained in place until 2009, when the Strip was resurfaced as part of the recovery from the Great Recession of 2008. 

Then And Now: William S. Hart House On DeLongpre:

Rear view of the home of silent film cowboy star William S. Hart as shown on a postcard c. 1920s (top) and as it appears in September 2012 (bottom), as a West Hollywood city park.

Then And Now:  Garden Of Allah Looking South From Sunset:

Top: The Garden of Allah which occupied a 3.5 acre site on the Sunset Strip between Crescent Heights and Havenhurst Avenue, as it appeared in 1935. Bottom: The Garden was bulldozed in 1959 to make way for the 1960s-style shopping center that is there now. It was a blight on the landscape the minute it was completed, and remains one today.

Then And Now:  Western End Of The Sunset Strip:

The top photo was probably taken in the early 1930s. The building on the left with the pan tile roof would later house the Cock ‘N Bull Restaurant, at 9170 Sunset Blvd. Hornburg Jaguar at 9176 Sunset Blvd. occupies the space today.

Then And Nows....we ❤️you.