The landmark French restaurant will be demolished for 166 apartments – and possibly a mini Taix
Ninety-nine years after the French dining institution was founded in Downtown Los Angeles, Taix restaurant will close its doors on Sunset Boulevard for the last time on March 29. The sprawling Echo Park landmark could accommodate over 400 diners and was a longtime favorite for banquets, celebratory dinners and milestone parties. Owner Mike Taix sold his family’s land in Echo Park to Washington-based developer Holland Group in 2019.
Taix opened in Downtown Los Angeles in 1927, seen here in 1956Credit: Security Pacific National Bank Photo Collection/Los Angeles Public Library
To the untrained eye, Holland has built nearly identical five and six-story apartment buildings up and down the West Coast. Their L.A. projects tend to be larger, with towering luxury apartments Downtown, in Koreatown and replacing the old K-Mart at 3rd & Ogden.
Taix in Echo ParkCredit: Photo by Chris Nichols
“My profits year by year have been going down,” Taix told the Los Angeles Times soon after selling the site, including its vast parking lot, for $12 million in 2019. He has remained as a tenant ever since, still dishing up French classics like Duck à l’orange and Tourte de Volaille.
Vintage menu from TaixCredit: Photo by Chris Nichols
The restaurant was successfully nominated as a Historic-Cultural Monument six years ago, but protection from that listing was undone by Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell. His intervention stripped the designation down to some exterior signage and an interior wooden bar top.
Four light fixtures at the entrance being sold together as lot #25. Highest bid at press time is $330Credit: Photo courtesy R.L. Spear
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“I was furious. They basically gutted the whole nomination which made it easier for them to tear the building down. It was unprecedented,” says historian Charles Fisher, who wrote the application. “The commission felt the building had been altered but the alterations are what made Taix what it is. When they moved in, they altered it to French Normandy look. It was altered to work for Taix.”
Mr. Taix plans to reopen a new, and much smaller, restaurant of some sort with the same name on the bottom floor of the 166-unit cube that will be entirely new but include the landmarked plastic signage and salvaged bar. Everything else at the restaurant is being auctioned by R.L. Spear of Westlake Village.
Vintage cart at Taix is item #1 in the auction. Highest bid at press time was $187Credit: Photo courtesy R.L. Spear
“They are keeping some items for eventual inclusion in the new facility,” David Spear, president of the Thousand Oaks-based auction house, tells Los Angeles. “Most of the good art, the chalkboard at the entrance, some chandeliers and sconces. Plus the stained glass.”
Everything else, including plates, silverware, kitchen equipment and décor will be among the 268 lots available until April 2. The restaurant closes on March 29.
Credit: Photo by Chris Nichols
Dining and Cooking