Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, philanthropist Aileen Getty, and jeweler Tiffany & Co. will all get a little something in Griffith Park in thanks for the money they donated last year to help buy Cahuenga Peak. It was the greatest saga of early 2010--138 acres of land near the Hollywood Sign was up for sale and everyone was nervous it'd go to developers, so the Trust for Public Land launched a campaign to buy it and donate it to the city to be added to Griffith Park. The TPL covered up the Hollywood Sign with a message to "Save the Peak," everyone rallied, and Getty and Tiffany donated $1.25 million each. But with only a few days left before the deadline, they were still $1 million short. In rode Hugh Hefner with a check and the peak was saved. TPL has now received permission from the city to put up four boulders with plaques, commemorating the purchase and Getty and Hefner's roles respectively, and a bench in honor of Tiffany, all on, near, or with views of the new land.
At its September 7 meeting, the Board of Recreation and Parks Commissioners gave final approval to the boulders and conceptual approval to the bench. According to a staff report, all of the plaques will be bronze, covered in graffiti protectant, and fully-funded by the TPL. Two general commemorative plaques will be mounted on five foot wide boulders, one at the Wonderview Drive trailhead on Cahuenga Peak and the other on Mount Lee (the peak with the Hollywood Sign on it). Those thank LA, California, and the big three donors, plus others including the Lucasfilm Foundation, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, Steven Spielberg, and "thousands of individual donors from California, and around the world."
Plaques for Getty and Hefner will be mounted on 28 inch by 20 inch boulders on Mount Lee. Getty's reads "Aileen Getty Ridge Trail" and Hefner's says "Hugh M. Hefner Overlook." The TPL will also add some landscaping and decorative rocks around all four sites.
Over on Mount Hollywood (the Griffith Observatory's peak), Tiffany & Co. will get a commemorative bench (with site improvements) on the Charlie Turner Trail, with views of the Cahuenga Peak land. The staff report on the bench says that the TPL is still in talks with a designer for the bench, but it'll probably be eight to ten feet long, and possibly have seating on both sides. An old New Yorker article on the sale suggests this might be a proposin' seat, but who can say what Hefner's rock will be used for.
· Hugh Hefner Sends Over Check, Hollywood Land Saved [Curbed LA]
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