South Pacific, Hawthorne , CA (apartments)

Name:South Pacific
Type:apartments
Street:13020 Kornblum Ave
City:Hawthorne
State:CA
Zip:90250
country:USA
Phone:
Status:operational

Description:
Polynesian apartments with fantastic architecture and gardens, but no tikis remaining. Still worth a visit.

This is the sight when exploring a new neighborhood that sends a thrill up your spine:

These are the South Pacific apartments in Hawthorne. They really stand out in a parade of standard 1960s apartments on Kornblum.

Great piling & chain walkways painted in what I hope is the original red.


This neighborhood is actually quite nice. The apartments are kept in immaculate condition. The tenants were all nice and friendly. No tikis left (I'm sure they rotted away years ago). But take a look at the interior:


There's this raised grassy courtyard in the center unlike anything I've seen in any other apartments. The small "park" is completely secluded by the dense tropical foliage surrounding it. Think of the tikis and tiki torches that once completed this scene.

Nice outdoor firepit by the rec room.

And inside the rec room, this original tiki bar with the thatch missing from the overhang:

Those stools look original, my friends...

...although the table and chairs do not.

I really give the owners credit for keeping this apartment complex in tip-top shape. This would be an easy one to restore to full tiki grandeur. Just add a bunch of carved tikis to the front and the grassy courtyard, restore the gas-fed tiki torches, re-thatch the bar, and you'd be ready to host tiki events all year round. Keep it in filed away in your brain for that time when you find yourself rich and in need of a good project.

Sabu

A couple of blocks down the street you get into a seedier neighborhood and this very narrow apartment complex which I doubt was called "The Kornblum" in earlier days.

No tikis inside or out, though the tropical foliage and the A-frames lead me to believe that this was probably another tiki apartment building. Address: 13311 Kornblum.

WOW! That's gotta be one of the most lovely tiki apartment complexes I've ever seen. That's a real knockout, and you're right, the owners deserve some kudos for keeping it in decent shape.

Great find Sabu!
What would we do without you.
I could actually live in Hawthorne now.

Unga- you should move to Hawthorne you would have some really cool neighbors if you know what I'm saying.

Hawthorne Baby! YA!

I stumbled across this place today while looking for street parking near the Hawthorne DMV. After my initial surprise and mild heart attack I was happy that I had my camera with me.

Super lush courtyard

Very cool BBQ wall.

Cool! Since I missed the original post by Sabu somehow: Sabu, has it changed much? Did the rec room get renovated? Boris, was there anything like the bar and stools that Sabu mentioned left in the rec room?

On 2008-04-30 23:31, bigbrotiki wrote:
Cool! Since I missed the original post by Sabu somehow: Sabu, has it changed much? Did the rec room get renovated? Boris, was there anything like the bar and stools that Sabu mentioned left in the rec room?

I didn't go into the rec room but through the rec room sliding glass doors, I saw some rattan chairs around a table. It didn't appear to be renovated. I can go back and check.

That's O.K., MAYBE Mr. Sabu will be moved to re-post some of his images...provided he still has them, and they are not lost in virtual space.

On 2008-05-01 07:30, bigbrotiki wrote:
That's O.K., MAYBE Mr. Sabu will be moved to re-post some of his images...provided he still has them, and they are not lost in virtual space.

That is so NOT O.K.! Knowing that I may have missed something original like the bar was driving me nuts so I had to go back and…

it’s still there.

This complex is really nice and also because of the grass and the trees the temperature was cooler inside. Something that I wish more landlords would realize.

Now even farther down the street than "The Kornblum" that Sabu mentioned was this boxy building.

Nothing special about it except it for these beams shooting out of the front of it.

I’ve never seen those types of beams in a non-Polynesian structure before, kinda strange but cool. Not cool enough to make me want to live there though. :)

nice pics, Boris. I love the entrance way!

In your last pic, I thought those were alligator heads at first! That's a non-committal, apartment complex. It's not sure what it is, so it just doesn't make sense.

According to this 1960’s phone book entry the South Pacific apartment complex was originally called the Hukilau.