The Watts Towers, Sabato (Simon) Rodia's creation - art from junk
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View of the towers
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Details showing construction. Note handle of broken cup on the RH side of the globe
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Another cup handle, fragments of china, glass, electrical insulators, shells, whatever he could find.
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Insulator and cup
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Chinese soup bowl among china fragments
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Intricate inner structure
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Designs cast into floor, probably from pieces of wrought iron
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Simon's street number and mailbox
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A second street number and mailbox. Note the "7-up" bottle. He uses lots of them for green glass. The blue is from "Milk of Magneisa" bottles.
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Inlaid broken glass
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And the occasional decorative tile. Supposedly he worked for a tile company for a while, before they found him taking some samples home for this project.
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The intricate structure is all steel welded together then covered with concrete and glass.
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Amazing collection of junk he used in the construction
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A gathering place, used by tour guides to let everyone sit during part of the tour
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The intricate structure has to be seen to be beileved!
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Simon named the towers - this is his sign for the West Tower
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All electrical insulators
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Looking up at the West Tower
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Wonder where he got the statue?
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Our tour guide, Syni Patterson, who ran a great tour and entertained us with her poetry about Simon Rodia
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Our tour guide, Syni Patterson, who ran a great tour and entertained us with her poetry about Simon Rodia
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Colorful member of our tour
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Looking east from the Arts Center
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Simply amazing!
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Kids in an art class at the center, reflected in their piano
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Art projects at the center, reflected in the shiniest piano I've ever seen!
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Portrait on a shovel
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Portaits on shovels
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Portait on a shovel
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