Next to Park La Brea, on the west just north of Hancock Park School, was the newest shopping mall in the area, the Town & Country. It had a modest, bungalow-like facade, a passel of shops (you could buy a fur-lined dog collar there if you wanted to), what we'd call a food court these days, really ourdoor dining, and enough parking to make everyone happy. Here's what it looked like in the mid-1950s.
Things started to slide downhill in the later fifties and early sixties. There was a fair amount of sniping from the Farmer's Market across the street, miffed at the food court concept and pointing out in their newspaper columns that they thought it up first. Eventually the old Town & Country was supplanted by the complext that now houses K-Mart and Whole Foods. The original food court is there, albeit with all new restaurants.
