A Street of Many Changes

A couple of decades ago, when Rodeo Drive was just another street, it contained a coffee shop, a gas station and a hardware store, according to old-timers.

These are long gone, of course, but even over the last decade or so, change has been constant on the street. Many of the stores that were on Rodeo in the early 1980s have disappeared.

Among stores that have moved on are Right Bank Clothing Co. and Tea Room, Mr. Guy, Gunn Trigere, Juschi, Elizabeth Arden and Kurt Geiger of Bond St. Ltd.

Some failed and some were driven off by soaring rents, which now range from $75 to $225 per square foot in the Two Rodeo/Via Rodeo development.

Two Rodeo itself made perhaps the most dramatic recent change in the street. The 1.25-acre project, at the corner of Rodeo and Wilshire Boulevard, gobbled up a savings and loan office, an exotic-car dealership and a few boutiques.

But, typical of Southern California, most of the site was a parking lot.