Community Corner
Locals Protest GQ Abbot Kinney Event
Some Venetians don't appreciate what they consider a different vibe being brought into Venice and the accompanying increases in rent and goods.
Locals concerned about the gentrification of Venice, specifically Abbot Kinney Boulevard, are staging a "Welcome to Venice, Now Go Home" event in protest of national magazine GQ's "GQHQ at the Brig” party. Both events are Saturday.
The protest is set to begin at noon and organizers are asking participants to bring homemade signs stating their displeasure with outsiders bringing even more outsiders to Venice. They blame such instances for increasing prices of goods and rent in the neighborhood, according to their Facebook post.
"Do we really need GQ bringing yet more unwelcome pressure to our corner of the Pacific by pumping the ridiculously gentrified and overpriced Abbot Kinney (formerly West Washington Blvd) yet more as the 'Coolest Block in America'?."
GQ editors dubbed the Abbot Kinney area as 'coolest' in the spring of 2012.
The GQ event is at 1515 Abbot Kinney Blvd. from 10 a.m.-7 p.m.
Read a full report on Media Bistro.
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