Echo Park Storefront Hides Mysterious Cavern, Peculiar Shop

Walk into the unassuming convenience store inside unit D of 1200 North Alvarado Street in Echo Park and you may notice this is no ordinary storefront.

Browse the selection of shampoos and hair dyes lining the shelves of this store and you may realize something is just a bit... off. Maybe you notice the baby sporting fangs on the baby powder bottle or the creepy clown face on the Revlon box, but one quickly realizes something is amiss.

While it may sound like the beginning of a scary movie, this Echo Park storefront is actually just another imaginative installation by the art group known as Machine Project and the unusual storefront is only a hint of what lies inside.

Each year, Machine Project transforms its Echo Park space into something different and this year, has turned it into a cave complete with plenty of mysterious illusions. Previous transformations have included a forest and sinking ship.

Visitors entering this year's transformation enter through the faux convenience store and then make their way into a dingy bathroom set and into a dark haunted cave. From there, they descend a narrow spiral staircase into Machine Project's 17-seat theater for one of a wide range of performances.

“It is a story that happens as you walk through," said Machine Project Programs Manager Jessica Cowley. “In general, people are just really intrigued and I think they enjoy the progress from the store, to the cavern, through the bathroom to the theater... It is a fun little story for them to travel through.”

Cowley said that their storefront appears so realistic that many people stop by and try to buy things from it.

"We actually get a lot of requests for lotto tickets because we actually have a lotto sign hanging in the window,” Cowley said. "The great thing is, it is real product but we actually had artists modify the packaging on some of the products that we sell."

In addition to the transformation of its upstairs space, the Machine Project is also hosting a wide range of performers and artists in its 17-seat theater in the basement. Performances range from a dance group to ambient musical performances (see their full schedule and lineup here)

The haunted cave installation, which has been open since October, will hold its last free open house hours for the public this Thursday-Saturday from 8-10 p.m. each night. Then, the cave and storefront will only be seen by those attending performances in the Machine Project's downstairs theater through January.

The cave open hours are free and open to the public. For more information on the transformation and performances at the theater, visit Machine Project's website.