Anything but Junk : It’s a Magic Kingdom for Decorators: From Toilets to Tiffany’s, Scavenger’s Paradise Has It All

Rick Evans looks anxious.

Fidgeting in the only chair in his cluttered office, he wears an expression that reveals he would rather be elsewhere.

The look is unnerving until a visitor realizes that Evans almost always wants to be somewhere other than the grounds of Scavenger’s Paradise--his architectural salvage business in Studio City.

“I get antsy here,” Evans said, glancing at his watch. “I can’t sit. I know there’s something out there I should see.”

Doors . . . fireplaces . . . columns . . . chandeliers . . . fountains and fixtures. Several housefuls of architectural gems are scattered over the 2,500-square-foot Scavenger’s lot. All have been removed by Evans from houses and buildings that have been gutted or demolished in Southern California.

“Toilets to Tiffany’s” reads a sign on the building at 4360 Tujunga Ave., where virtually anything that falls in-between--including a 3,500-pound bronze elevator from Los Angeles City Hall--can be had for a price.

“Some people call it junk,” Evans said. “But that doesn’t sit too well with me.”

Nor with the movie studio art directors, interior designers and other curious folk who converge on Scavenger’s Paradise 6 days a week in search of pieces to complement their sets and homes.

Shoppers and curiosity-seekers come to stroll and pick their way through the back-yard showplace, which is like taking a walk through an architectural history of Los Angeles.

A Kind of Toy Store

“It’s an adult version of a toy store,” said John Frayer, a longtime customer who lives in Laurel Canyon. “I get very excited about things that were made to last. The quality and craftsmanship of things that are made today isn’t the same. It doesn’t have the magic or vibrations of the past.”

Chandeliers from Humphrey Bogart’s estate, pieces from the Gloria Swanson and Hal Roach estates, and others from the old Vermont Theatre are among the things that have come and gone through Scavenger’s.

“This is a fun business, where every day is different,” Evans said. “You never know who is going to call or what’s going to happen.

“Sometimes you get into places that are almost slumlord conditions, and other times you’re in mansions in Beverly Hills.”

Evans, 33, took over the business six years ago from his late father, Ernie.

Ernie Evans had moved his family from Gary, Ind., to Southern California in the early 1950s and worked in the construction department at Universal Studios before opening Scavenger’s Paradise in 1955.

“He opened the same year as Disneyland,” said Elizabeth Banke, Rick’s older sister. “And for a lot of people in this town, Scavenger’s was like a magic kingdom.”

Vincent Price and many other Hollywood personalities were among the customers who frequented the original yard on old Cahuenga Road near what is now Universal City.

“Ernie was one of those marvelous legends nobody knows about,” said Milt Larsen, founder of the Magic Castle in Hollywood, the Variety Arts Center in Los Angeles and Mayfair Music Hall in Santa Monica--all of which were refurbished with the help of Scavenger’s Paradise.

“The average guy goes in to salvage those kinds of things with a crowbar,” Larsen said. “Ernie would get those things out without a scratch. He removed architectural artifacts like a fine dentist removes a tooth.”

The Hemingway Look

With his leathery skin and silver hair and beard, Ernie Evans bore a striking resemblance to Ernest Hemingway. He often sat in a big rocking chair in front of the business and greeted customers and passers-by with candy. His pockets were full of silver dollars that he gave away to children, and one of his socks served as his cash register: It was always stuffed with a wad of bills.

“If Ernie liked you, you could go in there and walk out with almost anything,” Larsen said. “If for any reason he didn’t like you, you could say I’ll give you a million bucks for a piece of garbage, and he’d say it wasn’t for sale.”

One thing Ernie Evans abhorred was a clean and orderly yard. He was repeatedly at odds with city officials, who harassed him to clean up a place he considered a museum.

“It was a mess, and people loved it that way,” said Rick, who began working with his father when he was 18. “They loved the feeling of discovery. You didn’t know where anything was. There were beautiful things hidden under other things.”

Three years ago, Rick moved Scavenger’s Paradise to Studio City. The yard, smaller and neater than the original, is behind a building that formerly was a reading school. Banke runs an antique-accessories shop out of the storefront, and Scavenger’s is in the back.

The business continues to attract a show-biz crowd, including actors Mark Harmon, who is a regular customer, Kirstie Alley and Harry Hamlin.

People who work behind the cameras also frequent Scavenger’s, which once provided most of the material for the set used on the “Sanford & Son” television series.

“Prop houses are consolidating, and they don’t keep as much variety,” said Mary Dodson, an art director who has shopped for set pieces at Scavenger’s for more than 20 years. “There are certain things that cannot be built today because the material and labor are too expensive.”

Prices at Scavenger’s Paradise vary depending on a piece’s age and condition. Doors run from about $25 to $2,500 for a solid copper front door. Stained-glass windows sell from $15 to $2,500. Smaller pieces such as doorknobs sell for $5 to $65 a set.

A telephone answering machine advises would-be shoppers of the yard’s irregular hours, but the catch-as-catch-can philosophy leaves many customers in limbo.

“I’ve got some terrible phone calls from people who’ve hit the machine three times,” Evans said. “They ask, ‘How’s he run a business? He’s never there.’ ”

On a recent Saturday afternoon, 10 people waited outside the entrance gate of Scavenger’s Paradise wondering when Evans would arrive. Some gave up and left after 30 minutes, but others peered curiously into the yard and held out for his eventual return.

“We’re not leaving,” said Mark Young, who had driven with his wife, Mary, from West Covina. “We’re redoing a house we just bought, so we have lots of projects.

Something Different

“We’re leaning toward the Southwest look, but you go to Southwest shops and they all start looking the same. So we’re here because we want to find something a little more unique.”

Despite the differences in age, occupation and taste of his customers, Evans said they all, inevitably, ask him the same question: Where do you get this stuff?

Evans said most of his merchandise comes from a network of construction and demolition company contacts who tip him off--often at a moment’s notice--about houses or buildings that are going to be torn down.

“Someone could call at any time and say, ‘Hey, I got a house coming down. Get down here and see what you want,’ ” Evans said. “I’ve literally run people out of here because you’ve gotta have merchandise and you can’t get it unless you’re there to see it and take it out. If it’s gone, that’s it. There’s no place else to get it.”

Evans also spends hours cruising the streets of various neighborhoods.

“You just kind of go to areas that you think are going to be developed,” said Evans, who drives a small truck and usually extracts pieces himself. “You kind of watch and hopefully hit the right day.

“I’ve driven to Beverly Hills and seen homes that I say, ‘Well, I know they’re going to come down.’ It’s just by a sense I’ve developed. After you’ve been around, you can tell if a home has been neglected and there’s no way they’re going to fix it up. You just wait and try to time it.”

Sometimes, however, the timing is not right.

“Last week, we were driving through Laurel Canyon on our way home from a wedding and I thought we were going to get into an accident,” said Evans’ wife, Valerie. “We went by a house that had been torn down and Rick couldn’t believe it.

“He said ‘How did I miss that?’ I told him, ‘You’re only one person; you can’t scope all of Los Angeles.’ ”

To that end, Valerie helps out. During her daily commute from Studio City to Beverly Hills, where she works as an office manager for an insurance company, she stays on the lookout for possible salvage accounts. “The minute I see a chain link fence go up,” she said. “I leave one of Rick’s business cards on the front porch.”

The Hunt Starts

Once Evans gains entrance to a structure, he becomes somewhat of a treasure hunter, traversing stairways and obstructions in search of architectural pieces that are often found below seeing-eye level.

“A lot of times it’s like hitting a vein in a gold mine,” said Evans, who has found as much as $300 in cash.

Other discoveries include a document penned by a Spanish explorer in 1506, and original blueprints and drawings by architect John Parkinson, who designed the Coliseum, Union Station and the Pacific Stock Exchange.

Evans admits that he has benefited from changes in decorating trends and the skyrocketing real estate market that has forced many people to refurbish rather than buy or sell a home. There are still times, however, when he wonders where his next architectural piece will come from.

“I always live in that fear that my resources will run out,” Evans said. “I ask myself, ‘What am I going to get next? Or where am I going to go?’

“But after I drive around and I see the old homes, buildings and the way the city is moving so fast--I don’t believe I’ll ever run out.”