The developer who is proposing a hotel for the site of Barney’s Beanery at Santa Monica Boulevard and Holloway Drive is holding another neighborhood meeting about the project.
The meeting will be from 6 to 7 p.m. Sept. 21 at Palihouse, 8465 Holloway Drive at Hacienda Place. At the meeting there will be stations where information and illustrations of the proposed project are available and where residents can pose questions and offer feedback. Free parking will be available at the Kings Road garage at 8383 Santa Monica Blvd.
The developer is a joint venture between VE Equities and the owner of Barney’s Beanery.
The proposed hotel would have 113 rooms with a below-grade live music space and recording studio. It would replace the existing surface parking lot with approximately 244 underground parking spaces. The project also would include the existing Barney’s Beanery, which will be disassembled and then restored to its current location at the center of the site. The site now also houses the Niko Niko sushi restaurant.
A neighborhood meeting in July sparked complaints online from area residents and others who feared a new hotel would generate additional traffic and worried about how well Barney’s Beanery would be preserved.
Barney’s, which opened in 1927, is known for customers such as musicians Jim Morrison of the Doors and Janis Joplin, poet Charles Bukowski and screenwriter Quentin Tarantino, who is said to have written the script for “Pulp Fiction” at Barney’s. It also is known for a sign that read “Fagots Stay Out.” That sign was removed in December 1984, days after West Hollywood was incorporated as its own city, by then-mayor Valerie Terrigno and the city council
I love the design of the proposed hotel. Finally a chance to clean up that grungy parking lot. Keeping some of the elements of Barney’s but reimagining the site will be great for our neighborhood. Hope they add a cafe or coffee house.
I went to the Open House last night for this hotel and 1) it is HUGE and gawdy! It doesn’t fit in with the neighborhood at all! 2) We already have a hotel directly across the street, perpendicular, two blocks over, and too many to count on Sunset. HELLO CITY COUNCIL, WE DO NOT NEED ANYMORE HOTELS IN WEHO!! 3) How about more park space? 4) How about affordable housing? 5) Have you considered the impact of the additional traffic on the area, not to mention the noise? 6) WE DON’T NEED TO CHANGE BARNEY’S! I have really had it… Read more »
@ Bill G Skywatcher….THANK YOU. You said it perfectly
It really says something about the commitment and appreciation for West Hollywood our civic leaders have when there is almost nothing they don’t want to tear down. Newer isn’t necessarily better, and generic glass and cement canyon streets can be found in any stupid city.
West Hollywood used to have a character that made living here unique. If y’all want to live with skyscrapers and tall buildings, why not move back East where they’re a dime a dozen?
The city council really needs to stop being so anti development. With some nice high rises on SMB we could have a beautiful sky line which could be seen for miles. Look how great downtown looks at night.
Someone should make a sitcom about a city council that just wants to turn every stupid little place into a hotel.
While we’re over there, let’s turn Niko Niko sushi into a hotel so that way we’ll have 4 hotels on the same block!! Who is even going to stay in all these hotels, where the only things within walking distance are other hotels?
This is so stupid. Not to mention ugly.
Barneys is a historic site and where shall I eat breakfast when I come to town???
Prepare for the near future as we citizen residents become less important in West Hollywood. Currently, we are regarded as a necessary nuisance because some (hardly enough to count) of us still vote and press demands upon the Council. Of course, that hapless condition could change if ……
Jesus, what a hideous eyesore. There are hotels going up all around this site. Isn’t there a way to do this where there isn’t an iconic restaurant (Barney’s) / venue (House Of Blues) / business (Amoeba) at stake? Move it east and replace a mini-mall! The only people who this will benefit are the developers and their bottom-line-only investors. I’m sure the plan to “disassemble/reassemble” Barneys at the center of the hotel will suffer an “accident,” the way the Giese House downtown was “accidentally” destroyed by Geoff Palmer’s construction crew. This is a laughably bad plan, both physically and culturally… Read more »
It’s rather hideous looking. Like a bad version of the Fred and Ginger building in Prague. Did they forget to remove the awning or is that just the percent they have to leave to get a grandfather clause in planning the rest of this mess?
There is absolutely no need for a hotel project at this particular location, it only adds density there and further traffic problems. If you want yet another hotel project within West Hollywood, move it further east. That’s the foremost concern here, however I definitely fall on the side of recognizing that Barney’s is a landmark and should just be left as it is. This is a huge two-fer of a bad idea in my book.
Gentrifiers complaining about gentrification. lmao