Set in what had been a mammoth bowling alley on the grubby intersection of Santa Monica and La Cienega Boulevards, the rink value roughly one million {dollars} in 1979 to construct and adorn, cash equipped by Mr. Ross’s two enterprise companions (one among them, Denny Cordell, was the English file producer who began Shelter Records) augmented with a last-minute infusion from Berry Gordy Jr., the founding father of Motown. The rink was not like the rest within the metropolis, its interiors a steady mural created by John Kosh, a graphic artist who throughout his profession would design greater than 1,000 album covers, though none extra iconic than one early effort: the Beatles’ “Abbey Road.”
“I wanted the place to have an old Hollywood feel,” Mr. Kosh stated by telephone from Los Angeles. “It was a magic cave with skaters whizzing around crashing into each other. The floor of the rink was poured in deep blue polyurethane to make it seem as though skaters were skimming the surface of a lagoon. I said, ‘Let’s just go crazy and have Carmen Mirandas bananas flying all over the ceiling.’”
For opening evening, Mr. Ross imported 24 members of the home skate crew at Empire Roller Disco, a gaggle whose strikes on the ground had been thought of unsurpassed. They had been resplendent in gold lamé, high-waist stretch pants, turbans and beaded braids and cornrows, Ms. Ross stated.
It was great, unimaginable, unbeatable, Mr. Ross recalled remarking to a buddy, who replied that it could be solely downhill from there.
‘What Was It About Flipper’s?’
And it could, though for 36 months — roughly the identical life span as one other memorable membership, Studio 54 — Flipper’s burned itself indelibly into the consciousness of habitués, entertained by a succession of surprises like a skater wearing nothing however her stockings and quads, a Prince live performance that featured the artist writhing on a purple mattress in a G-string or the common gigs by the Go-Go’s, who performed on a stage in the course of the rink.
“It was an awesome, awesome spot,” Nile Rodgers, the Grammy-winning musician and co-founder of Chic, stated by phone from London. Whenever he discovered himself in Los Angeles to carry out or produce music for different artists, his nightly rounds of clubbing invariably started at Flipper’s, the place he usually arrived on his personal eight wheels.
