Happy Thursday, everyone. Last night I met friends for a drink at Triste, tonight I’m headed to the 50 Chairs opening at Christie’s, and tomorrow I’ll be shooting the first edition of a fun new visual feature for the letter. Stay tuned.
In today’s issue: Madonna makes a major material purchase in Los Feliz, Wilde’s closes its daytime window, the Win~Dow has rats, Ome Dezin is hiring in Silver Lake, Nithya establishes a double-digit lead, Europeans weigh in on what east siders should eat and drink in Paris and Copenhagen, new stores are opening in Silver Lake and Melrose Hill, the potentially lifesaving entertainment bill, Justin Bieber plays a surprise show at MacArthur Park, and a can’t-miss house for sale in Highland Park.
It’s a terrible, no good, very bad week for windows (and The Win~Dow) in LA.
On Tuesday, the always-jammed Silver Lake location of The Win~Dow was shuttered by the health inspector after a “rodent infestation” was discovered at the Sunset Junction restaurant. The official posting by the Department of Public Health cited the aforementioned rodent problem as well as a separate “vermin infestation,” so maybe there were two unwanted species living in the burger joint? The restaurant’s management took a slightly vaguer tack, announcing it was merely closed temporarily for “maintenance.”
Despite all the social media chatter, it appears the rodent fiasco at The Win~Dow was short-lived — as of sending this email, the health department notices are gone and the restaurant is back open for business. Whatever the case, I ordered from Burgers Never Say Die last night.
As if that weren’t enough window-related news for the week, yesterday the team at Wilde’s announced that the restaurant will be permanently shuttering its daytime café window on 10/3. The news comes a few weeks after Wilde’s nixed indoor dining during the day as a last-ditch attempt to preserve café service, and reflects the unfortunate reality that the financials for the café program “just didn’t work.”
This one’s a bummer — the Wilde’s café was a great place to hang out — but the good news is that the dinner program is here to stay (and the restaurant is now offering brunch service on Saturdays and Sundays). Per a statement by the team, “Numbers are boring and have candidly never really been a priority” at Wilde’s. Unfortunately, that’s probably why the food and the dining experience at the restaurant are both so good.