Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 1115

My friend Dan just introduced me to a terrific podcast called, How I Built This . It’s all about “innovators, entrepreneurs, and idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.” As soon as he told me about it I immediately pulled out my phone and hit subscribe.

You will recognize many of the brands and entrepreneurs featured on this podcast. The companies span everything from Whole Foods and the Corcoran Group (real estate) to Kate Spade and Instagram.

I’m not that up on podcasts. I think it’s because I don’t really drive that often and I don’t have much of a commute. Podcasts are great when you’re sitting in traffic, which is something people here in LA obviously do a lot of.

But I’m going to make time to listen to this one. I have so much respect for anyone who has built something from nothing. Building and creating is what moves us forward.

So it turns out that what may be missing from your city is just a bright candy pink wall.

I was walking along a stretch of Melrose Avenue today that didn’t seem to have all that much going on. But then I came across a bright pink building with a subtle Paul Smith emblem near the top corner. I like Paul Smith and so I decided to pop in.

But as I turned the corner, I was greeted by throngs of millennials all posing for photos along the building’s west face (read: lots of afternoon sun). Here’s a snap of what that looked like:

Once inside, I was quickly told that the pink wall is the most Instagrammed location in all of Los Angeles . I’m not sure that’s factually true, but I’m going to say it’s up there. A quick review of #pinkwall seems to suggest that.

What I find interesting is the simplicity of it all. It’s a pink wall. And people love it. If you believe that we are now living in an attention economy, then perhaps you ought to find or create your own version of a candy pink wall.

Oftentimes when I visit a city I like to ask myself: Which neighborhood would I want to live in if I were to move here?

Today I spent much of the afternoon hanging around Venice. After we got there, I told my friend that if I moved to LA, I would probably want to live there. I told him that, relative to the rest of the city, I liked the compressed scale of the neighborhood. There are many pedestrian-only lanes and streets beyond the boardwalk. And I told him that I thought it was interesting how the neighborhood seems to combine both bohemians and yuppies (though many people seem to hate the yuppy part ).

But I’m obviously not alone in my thinking. My friend quickly informed me that Venice is one of the most expensive neighborhoods in LA and that it’s been adding essentially no new housing supply. Here’s an excerpt from an LA Weekly article  published at the beginning of this year:

Anti-development activists like to argue that development fuels gentrification, that the construction of new, high-end apartment buildings makes the whole neighborhood more expensive.

But the case of Venice is a counterpoint. For the last 50 years, Venice has successfully fought developers to a stalemate. The housing supply stayed constant, while demand grew. As a result, the value of property in Venice has soared.

In 1996, according to data provided by Zillow, the average home value in Venice was $251,000 — more expensive than Silver Lake and Encino but cheaper than Westwood, Studio City, Mid-Wilshire and Los Feliz. Today, Venice’s average home value is nearly $1.6 million, more expensive than all of those neighborhoods — more expensive, in fact, than its historically tony neighbor to the north, the city of Santa Monica, which, according to Alvarez’s research, added more than 10,000 dwelling units between 1960 and 2010.

Perhaps I should give this some more thought.