Matchbook collection from 15 vintage Los Angeles restaurants and bars

Here’s a quick pop quiz for you: Of the 15 LA restaurants represented here in Tara Gordon’s photo, which ones have you (a) heard of, or (b) not heard of, or (c) visited personally? I’ve heard of them all but 2: Side Show and The Victor Hugo Inn (which isn’t the same as Victor Hugo restaurant that used to be on Wilshire Blvd in Beverly Hills) And I’ve only been to one of them: the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel. What about you?

Matchbook collection from 15 vintage Los Angeles restaurants and bars

  • HOLLYWOOD PALLADIUM – Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles
  • MOULIN ROUGE – Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles
  • BROWN DERBY – Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles
  • NICKODELL – Melrose Ave, Los Angeles
  • POLO LOUNGE – Beverly Hills Hotel, Sunset Blvd, Beverly Hills
  • THE HANGOVER – Vine St, Hollywood
  • SIDE SHOW – Hollywood Blvd, Hollywood
  • HOLLYWOOD PLAZA HOTEL – Vine St, Hollywood
  • CIRO’s – Sunset Blvd, West Hollywood
  • COCOANUT GROVE – Ambassador Hotel, Wilshire Blvd
  • BROWN DERBY – Vine St, Hollywood
  • FIREFLY – Vine St, Hollywood
  • THE VICTOR HUGO INN – Laguna Beach
  • MIKE LYMAN’S GRILL – Vine St, Hollywood (Lyman also had two restaurants in downtown LA as well as Mike Lyman’s Flight Deck and LA International Airport

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10 responses to “Matchbook collection from 15 vintage Los Angeles restaurants and bars”

  1. Clint Thetford says:

    Hello Martin, I have a matchbook collection similar to this one. One additional matchbook I found is from The Garden of Allah but with no matches inside.
    Still a nice collectible for me anyway.?
    I thoroughly enjoy seeing all of your pic’s of Old Classic
    Hollywood/Los Angeles.
    Clint

  2. Mary says:

    I’m familiar with nine of them, and have been to three: the Palladium, the Brown Derby on Wilshire, the Cocoanut Grove. Feel like I’ve been to Nickodell’s as I worked with a former Paramount employee, and it was apparently a beloved hangout for people who worked there. He seemed to mention it a lot. Hopefully soon I will add the Polo Lounge, as it is on a bucket list I share with a friend. Unfortunately I was a late arrival to Los Angeles, moving here in 1964, so I missed the Garden of Allah, to my everlasting regret.

  3. M. Mitchell Marmel says:

    HOLLYWOOD PALLADIUM – heard of
    MOULIN ROUGE – heard of
    BROWN DERBY – heard of
    NICKODELL – nope
    POLO LOUNGE – heard of
    THE HANGOVER – nope
    SIDE SHOW – nope
    HOLLYWOOD PLAZA HOTEL – heard of
    CIRO’s – heard of
    COCOANUT GROVE – heard of
    BROWN DERBY – heard of
    FIREFLY – nope
    THE VICTOR HUGO INN – nope
    MIKE LYMAN’S GRILL – nope, but if Mike Lyman’s Flight Deck at LA International Airport was around in the early 80s, I MIGHT have stopped in…

  4. pdq says:

    The Victor Hugo Inn was actually a restaurant. The building still exists and it is known today as Las Brisas, up on the cliff overlooking Main Beach next to the art museum. It was apparently quite posh in the day. Las Brisas is still pretty posh itself.

    My parents had their first date at the Victor Hugo in 1952/53. Mom, who lived in the Pasadena area, had been invited to a wedding down in Laguna and needed an escort. Her beau was unavailable, being in the Air Force stationed in Alaska. Dad (who had just gotten out of the Air Force and was visiting his aunt, who was mom’s stepmother) was pressed into action. After what I presume was an early afternoon wedding, they apparently stopped at the Victor Hugo for dinner. Mom and Dad were married in 1954 – at the beautiful St. Andrew Catholic Church in Pasadena .

    https://stunewslaguna.com/index.php/archives/front-page-archive/11049-laguna-beach-a-look-back-071919

  5. Bob Powers says:

    I’ve heard of most of these but sadly have not visited any of them except Ciro’s which I believe is now a comedy club? My dad was a professional musician in LA from the mid-1950’s to the early 1980’s. He played gigs at The Ambassador Hotel (possibly in the Cocoanut Grove, or some other room), as well as at Chasen’s and Perino’s.

  6. Martin Pal says:

    I’ve heard of all of these places, but only visited one of them. I had dinner on my birthday in 1981 at the Hollywood Brown Derby! The Side Show was one I thought I didn’t know, but when I found out where it was I realized I did. It was on Hollywood Blvd. right near the El Capitan Theatre now owned by Disney. I don’t know when it closed, but it was around in the ’80s as online I found out references to it being seen on Miami Vice and Perfect Strangers. It’s also in the opening montage of dive bars seen in the film Barfly. As of late it’s been a couple of different kinds of markets. If you search the address on Google images (6818 Hollywood Blvd.) you’ll find more recent photos of that location with a car that’s been driven into the front of it!

    I always think of The Hangover on Vine Street when I watch I Love Lucy episodes when they were in Hollywood. On the backdrop of Hollywood you see from their hotel room, you’ll notice a sign that says “Seaboard Loans.” The Hangover was below that sign at street level!

    I love this colorful photo of matchbook covers! That’s one thing I miss when traveling. I’m not a smoker and never needed matchbooks, but I always looked for them when on vacation as a tangible memento of places one visited. Does any place still have matchbooks? Is there a satisfactory substitute?

  7. Bill Wolfe says:

    I’ve heard of all of them except Mike Lyman’s. I haven’t been to any, sadly, unless you count being inside the Comedy Club, since it’s the same structure as Ciro’s. (I don’t count that, since any place that provided a venue for Sam Kinison has nothing in common with Ciro’s.)

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