Editor’s Note: The original version of this story misspelled the last name of Darryl Holter. This version has been edited to reflect the change.
Kendall Brill & Kelly partner Bert Deixler, like all successful attorneys, is well aware that part of the job is connecting with clients and finding ways to put them at ease.
So when Deixler, 63, began chatting one fall afternoon in 2014 with client Darryl Holter – chief executive of the Downtown L.A. Auto Group – about their shared love of Chevalier’s Books in Hancock Park, he expected little more than a couple of good book recommendations and a slightly stronger attorney-client bond. The conversation, however, took a different turn.
“(Holter) finally said to me, ‘Why don’t we just buy it?’” Deixler recalled.
The next day, the attorney found himself at the independent bookstore asking the nonagenarian owner exactly what the damage might be if they decided to make an offer.
“She named a price that I think was less than my bar mitzvah money,” Deixler said, so he and Holter decided to go for it.
Since the sale closed in October 2014, Deixler has used the space to bring in speakers, authors, musicians, and panelists for a series of special events. Discussions have ranged from the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II – the panel featured Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge A. Wallace Tashima, an internee during the war – to a talk by Los Angeles Lakers great Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on Sherlock Holmes that devolved into a referendum on New York high school basketball in the 1960s.
“It’s been a lot of fun because it’s given me the chance along with (Holter) to hear from, talk to, and solicit people I’ve found very interesting,” Deixler said.
As for the bookselling business?
“It’s got everything going for it but profits,” Deixler said with a chuckle.
Root Interest
Shawn Featherstone, founder of Petal Forest in Los Angeles, loves to travel when she’s not running her floral design studio.
Featherstone, 55, said her most memorable trip was visiting Hong Kong in 1987. She added that it was a bit challenging since she didn’t speak Cantonese or Mandarin, but it was still fun to sightsee and shop.
Her trip was also significant because it was 10 years before Hong Kong reverted back to mainland China.
“Friends we had there were preparing for their kids to go to college in the States,” Featherstone said. “In case things didn’t go well they could leave the country.”
Their efforts highlighted how different life was there compared to living in the United States.
“As Americans, we don’t have to concern ourselves (with that),” she said. “But it told me in the end we’re all the same. We want our children to be happy and to be able to have a good life.”
Staff reporters Henry Meier and Subrina Hudson contributed to this column. Page 3 is compiled by Editor Jonathan Diamond. He can be reached at [email protected].
