The 2.5 acres on Sunset Boulevard and Crescent Heights in Los Angeles where a Frank Gehry-designed development was slated to be built is now for sale again.
The property was once home to the Garden of Allah, a cloistered resort for the A-List of Hollywood’s Golden Age. For the last 10 years, the city of Los Angeles and Townscape Partners have tried to jumpstart a major project on the valuable corner. Renderings for the Gehry-designed building were released last year after the historic Lytton Savings Building and the nearby shopping strip with one of the only two McDonald’s adjacent to WeHo were demolished.
UrbanizeLA reports that the entitlements secured for the project remain active.
Make it a PARK with parking lot at the rear…
Haven’t been in town a bit- so El POLLO LOCO and McDonalds are gone? That whole complex? man was it ugly…I remember when they tore down Schwabs to put up that monstrosity across the road!
I feel you BUT an EL POLLO LOCO did open on the street side, ground floor below Trader Joe’s
I think the endless anticipation… Left me with too high of hope.
It’s like “El Polo Loco Light”
A whole new menu based on bowels & thankfully Tostadas.
How are they serving the bowels?
Sounds disgusting.
Townscape is known for bait and switch. They had multiple iterations of projects for this land and used Gehry to give credibility, but within the development community, it was well know they never planned to build anything here. They wanted to clear the land and sell at a huge profit.
What other bait & switch are you referring to? The first iteration by Hart Howerton was presentable and in my opinion their firm could have done a fitting project. Townscape was inexperienced but hit many breaks with the Beverly Blvd Project from WH. Also had an excellent architect.
https://la.urbanize.city/post/hollywood-site-entitled-frank-gehry-designed-project-market
https://wehotimes.com/8150-sunset-blvd-project-is-a-bust-lot-once-home-to-garden-of-allah-is-for-sale/
Additional coverage of LYTTON BANK @ 8150 SUNSET.
Yes another block-sized dirt hole along Crescent Heights joins the aged one at Santa Monica Blvd. a couple blocks south. Where once we had businesses that served residents, we now get years of urban blight.
Kudos to all involved.
There was a definite opportunity for the landmarked Lytton Bank Building to have been preserved and moved to the Crescent Heights location as a focus for a related development. City of West Hollywood, where were you? It unnecessarily became a pile of dust.
This land and project are in the city of Los Angeles, so unfortunately West Hollywood had very little say in this project.
Even so WH had responsibility to stand for their residents as there were exponential effects of the project construction on infrastructure, traffic et al. WH had a prior relationship w Townscape where they literally gave away the farm. Horvath & Meister were poor negotiators.
Let’s not get too deep. THIS IS NOT IN WEHO but in City of Los Angeles.
All the smoke & mirrors from WeHo City Council & Mayor du jour about the years to come.
No mention of the GIGANTIC projects in WeHo like the SMB DOHENEY.
Never believed Geary was designing the project in the first place.
Very sad outcome. The well intended and diligent efforts of the Preservation Community were continually and unnecessarily thwarted by Townscape. The original Kurt Myer Lytton Bank Building could have been utilized in a time span development by Frank Gehry and could have made a unique somewhat evolutionary project. Also sad was West Hollywoods rather spineless lack of involvement even though the project was technically in Los Angeles. The empty location nearly approximates the dividing line between the two. Here was a missed opportunity to engage in a project where they were literally allowing Townscape carte blanche to define the “Gateway… Read more »
Can’t wait to see the scaled back design, sans Gehry. The big question is whether Frank will retire or die before construction starts.
He got paid his huge commission, so I am sure he could care less if anything gets built here. His name was used to expedite the approval and clearing, so townscape could sell a shovel ready site for a huge profit.
The last Changed Plans were two ugly mirrored rectangular buildings.
All office glass & no patios or windows that opened.