Building Isn’t a Purple People Pleaser

Frances Berumen has no trouble directing customers to her legal document shop near the Centerpoint Mall. “Look for the ugly purple building,” she says.

Berumen’s store at Saviers Road and Laurel Street sits across the street from “the Barney Building,” so called because of its lavender-and-plum exterior.

But some neighbors are working to make sure that the color of the building, which houses a music store and a dental office, goes the way of the dinosaurs.

“It is the ugliest-looking thing you ever saw,” said Bernadette Ostrowski, chairwoman of the Cal-Giesler Neighborhood Council.

Ostrowski and her group want the building’s color scheme to be more subdued.

“I’m going to give them another week and then I’m going back to the City Council,” Ostrowski said.

When the Oxnard Dental Practice opened its doors in November, the exterior of its building was a pale green, office manager Sandy Diaz said. Two months ago, the Ritmo Latino music store moved in next door, and the outside of the building was painted purple. The rest of the Centerpoint Mall is beige and light blue.

“They’re all subtle except us,” Diaz said.

Berumen, who is Latino, thinks there might be some cultural reasons behind the new hue.

“We are known for bright, lively, vivacious colors,” said Berumen, whose desk faces Saviers Road and the purple side of Ritmo Latino. “It’s part of who we are.”

But even so, she doesn’t like it.

“It’s just a very tacky color,” Berumen said.

Store managers at Ritmo Latino said that each of the 36 Ritmo Latino stores across the country uses the same interior dark purple-and-yellow color scheme.

They have not heard any complaints about the color and doubt that there is any cultural prejudice at play, said Rafael Garcia, the store’s assistant manager.

In fact, retailers of all ethnicities have been leaning toward flashier colors, Mayor Manuel Lopez said.

“I think that’s kind of a trend right now all over,” Lopez said. “I like the earth tones myself.”

The mall, which owns the building, chose the lavender color to complement Ritmo Latino’s signature dark purple entryway, said Steve Tomko of Tomko Woll Group, the mall’s architects.

Tomko likes the new look.

“The building had been the same color for close to 10 years and was faded,” he said. “The mall is looking at the tenants that are coming in and also trying to make the building noticeably different than it had been.”

Although the north wall of the adjacent Auto Zone was painted purple in error, the controversial color will otherwise remain exclusive to the Ritmo Latino building, Tomko said.

“There is no expectation that the purple color will kind of wander around the mall,” he said.

But city officials aren’t sure they want purple anywhere.

Businesses are supposed to get approval from the city before they redo their looks, said Marilyn Miller, the city’s planning and environmental services manager.

“The appropriate process is to come in and get the color approved before you apply it to the entire building,” she said.

Miller expects to receive a request from the mall that asks for a color variance. The city will then check to see if the purple color fits into the color scheme for the mall and the surrounding businesses, she said.

“If it doesn’t, we would make recommendations that they select another color,” Miller said.

The mall plans to file its modification papers with the city any day now, Tomko said.

“They’ve been patient but insistent,” he said.

The purple building has one upside, said Lupe Vaca, office assistant at Oxnard Dental Practice.

“It’s easier for patients to find,” Vaca said. “The color, though, is a bit extreme.”