Wouldn’t it be nice if LA still had stores like this. To be clear, it still does, but there aren’t nearly as many as there used to be, and that’s a grand shame because they add so much to a pleasant urban landscape. This particular building housed Chapman’s Fancy Ice Creams at 60 S. Lake Ave on the northeast corner of Green St in Pasadena. This photo was taken in 1928. Whenever I see a sign for “Chapman’s Fancy Ice Creams” I always wonder if the word “Fancy” was an official part of the brand name, or was it simply the adjective they chose to describe their product?

When I brought up that location to see what it looked like today, I held out hope that the building was still there as Pasadena’s track record for preserving old buildings is better than most. But alas, this is how that corner looked in July 2022.