Creative Office Developer Heads Downtown

LOS ANGELES—Los Angeles-based developer King's Arch has acquired a vacant six-story Art Deco building in Downtown Los Angeles' historic core. After a series of upgrades starting this quarter, the developer will reposition the property into a creative office space with ground floor retail.

“Our primary focus is bringing back outdated buildings to creative office space, typically with a retail component on the ground floor,” Allen Shamooilian, co-founder of King's Arch, tells GlobeSt.com. “The building is gorgeous from the exterior, and it is historically significant, but at the same time the bones on the inside are equally suited to creative office space. It has incased trusses, concrete floors, rustic brick walls and operable windows, and has two roof decks—which is very unique.”

The developer purchased the building for $7.35 million, and plans to invest an additional $5 million to renovate the property, which will include a voluntary seismic upgrade as well as upgraded HVAC and electrical systems. Construction is set to begin this quarter and the property will deliver at the end of the fourth quarter. Currently, it is one of only two creative office developments underway in the nearby area, which is incased in a sea of multifamily development. The second office development is GPI Companies and Atlas Capital's joint venture to transform the former Coca-Cola packing plant into a creative office space.

“Although there is some office space, true creative office space is hard to find,” says Shamooilian. “We have found that before we started marketing it, we have had prospects knocking on our door. There is a greater demand currently than we expected, and with all of the new multifamily development in the area, clearly the future is only going to be brighter over time.”