Developer Unveils Downtown Loft Project

GLENDORA, CA-Gangi Development of Burbank has started construction of its Vermont Avenue Lofts, a mixed-use condominium, office and retail development that will be one of the first in this city's Downtown in decades. The site of the $14.2-million project is just over an acre of land owned by the city's Community Redevelopment Agency on Vermont Avenue, just north of Foothill Boulevard.

The development will feature 26 for-sale condominiums, including live-work units, along with 6,000 sf of office and retail space. It is scheduled to be completed in September.

According to Mark Gangi, vice president at Gangi Development, the project has been designed so that the three-story loft units are "stepped back" in the center, making it appear as two stories. The lofts will be bordered in front by a covered porch and trellis where six flats with two bedrooms and two baths ranging from 1,383 sf to 1,544 sf will be situated.

At the rear of the site will be 15 surface parking spaces available for public parking, and a ramp leading to 54 private parking spaces serving the housing. Above the ground floor will be a series of five four-plexes consisting of 20 lofts that will range from 1,137 sf to 1,385 sf.

Two retail/office spaces will open onto front yard spaces and to the street. The retail/office spaces have been designed so that they can be entered from either the front or the rear of the project, or from the common lobbies of the housing.

Mark Gangi also served as project architect and collaborated on the initial design with Stefanos Polyzoides of Moule and Polyzoides, Architects and Urbanists. Gangi Development, headed by president Frank Gangi, has created projects in Southern California since 1947 and is known for designs like its Media Village, a mixed-use development in Burbank that includes 146 units of senior housing units, 60,000 sf of retail and office space, and 500 subterranean parking spaces.