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This sign for the long-gone Clifton's Silver Spoon Cafeteria on West 7th Street — "a jewel of a cafeteria" — is visible only across a parking lot from Grand Avenue. The street address, 515 West 7th, is currently the location of Mas Malo. The former Clifton's was used as a filming location for "Fight Club" in 1999.
The sign's slogan is a small pun. Before Clifton's moved in, the building was known to Angelenos as the home of the Brock Jewelery Co., for decades a prominent Los Angeles store. Brock kept its offices there and a small jewelry factory on upper floors, according to a history recounted at Blogdowntown in 2008 by lawyer John Welborne, whose cousin married into the Brock family. Clifton's took over in the mid 1970s and opened a smaller, less-themed version of its more famous downtown cafeterias. The ground-floor Silver Spoon closed in 1997 after 20 years, with a sale of fixtures and memorabilia, including signs. The sign painted on the back wall was left alone.
Nice photo of the front of the building by Martin Schall.
LA Observed photo
