pacific design center: the mall that nobody wanted

years ago, eons in the past, I worked in a hellish land of fire, brimstone and modern, innovative furniture (but not in my showroom).

it was a major millennial life achievement of getting a real job, because it's just so natural to go from teaching english in rural china to rubberstamping foreign applications at USC to importing hordes of chinese students into catholic schools to selling furniture literally coated in gold. don't we all do that at some point?

I worked in the Pacific Design Center. You've driven past it a million times. It's that huge building at San Vicente and Melrose that literally no one ever thinks about or even knows why it's there.

it's fuckin weird.

It's famous, I guess, leading to starry eyed reviews from the LA Times like this one:

"It can be a bit daunting to navigate through the multi-leveled PDC alone. In fact, it’s not recommended that you attempt to visit the showrooms on your own."

or this one:

"For one thing, it will be very near impossible, or at least difficult, to command the attention of the showroom staff, as most or all of these cater to trade only interior design professionals."

 

it's so quiet you can hear your blood pumping. thump thump thump

there are no people. ever. it's almost like walking through a futuristic dystopian movie set.

oh wait. it literally is:

The inside is beautiful and not a bad way to start the day, if you have no need or want of human interaction, which I appreciate immensely.

 

 

there's a plaque that says something like: this highly expressive contortion of engineered aspen seems to float from the ceiling, secure, yet precarious. for inspiration, the artist coated a hand grenade in ground beef and placed it into a bowl of fettucine, where a high-speed camera captured this elegant and vivacious formation that evokes the inherent chaos of space-forming, while demonstrating the intricate ways in which each component of modern design and materials intertwine and interact.

JUST KIDDING I'M A LIAR

Oh well.

At least the elevators are really nice. they actually close when you push the close door button. Sometimes you get lucky and they jam and you get to spend 45 minutes waiting inside for techs to arrive and it gets REALLY hot in there. But hey, you're on the clock, too!

the escalators are good for instagram photos.

there’s only been like two suicides there so it’s totally fine.

but this is the weirdest thing. the building is like a complete fraud.

the sixth floor of the blue building is stunning.

i've literally never seen another person here, but loro piana and scalamandre have very expensive storefronts here.

 

one day, I was like, i'm gonna go down those elevators. i'm gonna explore this massive mall of design. i'm gonna see what this building has to offer.

I barely escaped death.

It's all a mirage.

here am I, all excited and naive going down the escalators from the sixth floor.

and the fifth floor is like completely empty except for some rando furniture in a corner and some abandoned store fronts. i'm like wtf but I don't pay attention to my intuition so I just keep going.

the fourth floor has stores. I don't know why, but it has like three.

as I walked around, I got the profound feeling that something was very wrong. this place is empty.

third floor. i'm sweating. can't tell if from fear or chipotle.

this is where bougie leatherface kills his victims. honestly. remember, someone is selling fabric at $800/yard like two floors above me, and it's just raw unfinished building. how long has it been like this?

i keep hearing weird noises and there's plastic sheeting everywhere and shadows and sounds of power tools grinding bones or concrete or wood or whatever and i'm wondering about how in movies usually the non-white characters die first and are there any horror movies with jews when do the jews die I don't wanna die.

I make it to the final escalator in a full blown panic for absolutely no discernible reason. and what am I greeted by? A red tag. Red tags are never good. Except at Neiman Marcus.

the first floor fucking elevator is red tagged as unsafe, the city has literally prohibited its use?? sorry. FORBIDDEN its use. shit's got me panicking in order to get out i'd have to go through the murder zones all the way to the sixth floor and cross the sky bridge to the green building to go back down but that's like really far but what if I step on the escalator and the stairs collapse and it eats me alive like a meat grinder??

I hear footsteps and run the fuck down the escalator like i'm a democrat and social justice is at the bottom. every time a step creaks my whole body goes weak and I almost kill myself like six times and I run out of the building onto the street drenched in sweat looking like a madman.

just what the fuck is going on with this building.