A Fork in the Road for Seal Beach Diner
The Parasol, a Seal Beach landmark known as much for the home-style cooking and waitresses’ familiarity with customers as its kitschy architectural design, is threatened with demolition to make way for a remodeling project at the Rossmoor Shopping Center.
Preservationists, employees and generations of loyal patrons are campaigning to save the 1967 diner that still serves old-fashioned ice cream sodas and cholesterol-packed Monte Cristo sandwiches. Nearly 6,000 signatures have been collected since demolition plans were unveiled a month ago.
The outpouring of support for the stylistic structure has prompted city officials to hire a consultant to study how it might be saved.
The petition seeks to preserve the Parasol as a structure and as a restaurant, prevent new structures from blocking its visibility from Seal Beach Boulevard, and maintain its accessibility, especially for the physically challenged.
But saving the eye-catching structure, with its white dome roof and pink spines, will require approval from several city agencies that have so far supported expansion of the Rossmoor center and the increased tax revenue it brings.
Nancy Luebben, 48, and her mother, Mary, 83, of Los Alamitos started the petition drive in the hope of preserving the restaurant.
“From the time it was built, it was an integral part of our family’s life,” Luebben said. She, her two sisters and their parents went to the Parasol every Saturday for breakfast while she was growing up, she said.
Luebben recalled they left earlier than usual one Saturday morning and returned to find that a ficus tree in their frontyard had fallen where the family car would have been if they had left at the usual hour.
“My sisters live in the area and now they take their families there,” she said.
Some Parasol employees are as familiar to the customers as the colorful chandeliers that resemble three open parasols.
Connie Miller, 38, who has worked at the Parasol for 14 years, joined her mother, Glenda Davies, who has worked there since 1969. Her grandmother, Joanie Gorman, worked there briefly when the restaurant first opened. Miller also met her husband, Mark, there in 1995 and her stepson, Ryan, 17, has worked there part time for three years.
“I have adopted grandparents who come in daily,” Miller said.
“We talk about our lives, their tragedies. I could name hundreds of people by their first names, and I could tell you probably what they’re going to order ... and certain foods they can’t have.”
Many of the customers see the Parasol as a social center as well as place to have breakfast.
Much of the clientele comes from Leisure World, a retirement community a short drive over the San Diego Freeway, and the early-bird specials are popular with those on a pension. Fans worry that the seniors will be lost without the Parasol.
“Where are they going to go?” said Barbara O’Connor, 58, of Westminster, sitting at one of the Formica walnut tables with her husband, Len, on red Naugahyde seats in one of the oversized booths that ring the interior.
The Parasol is a hybrid of architectural styles that flourished in postwar Southern California: Googie, which features sharp angles, large areas of glass, sweeping cantilevered roofs and futuristic themes, and programmatic, where the structure mimics what it sells or its own name. Other examples of the latter include the late, lamented Brown Derby restaurant on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles and the Donut Hole, a drive-through that still serves doughnuts in La Puente.
But both styles are rapidly disappearing from the landscape.
“There are some good examples left, but much of Southern California’s quirky and kitschy commercial architecture has been lost or is often in danger,” said Ken Bernstein, director of preservation issues for the Los Angeles Conservancy.
In recent years, however, communities have started to embrace flamboyant architectural styles, Bernstein said.
Luebben said she hopes the Parasol is one of those that is spared. “Seal Beach prides itself on being a preservationist city, maintaining a [small-town] ambience. We’re going to see if this proves to be true,” she said.
The Rossmoor Center project by Century National Properties would add stores and restaurants and remodel some existing buildings. Company officials would not return calls seeking comment.
City officials said public sentiment has led to the hiring of a consultant who will determine whether the building has historical significance.
Parasol owner Roy Hall, who has worked at the restaurant since it opened, said the developers have discussed building a structure that he can lease, but he would rather keep the original and restore it to its former glory.
“The Parasol is basically the community’s restaurant,” Hall said. “They love that restaurant, and they love that building. Once it’s torn down, you’ll never see another like it.”
