Construction is going up on the southeast corner of Wilshire and Crenshaw where an under-utilized parking lot sat for years, surrounded by a rim of Oleander trees. What’s next? A monolithic 30 unit apartment complex. Building is underway.
The four-story property brought to the neighborhood by the developer “4180 Wilshire LLC” is a pseudo-Mediterranean style that features a clay tile roof, precast trim, cornices and pillars, and wrought iron balconies. It may try to reference some of the stately homes in nearby Wilshire Park and Windsor Village, but is one of those over-sized, uninspired buildings that completely lacks originality.
Too bad the architects couldn’t play off the renown Harbor Building, just across the street to the north, that the LA Conservancy recognizes for its perfect combination of “Late Moderne and Corporate International” styles. Built in 1958 by Claud Beelman (who also did the Standard Oil Building downtown), the Harbor Building is clad mainly in white marble with stainless steel spandrels and windows and, though vast in size, is elegant and impressive at the same time.
The new apartment building at 4180 Wilshire butts right up to the busy intersection, with just 10 feet of green footage in the front and 15 feet in the back – a mere strip – and appearing to use a density bonus as approved by City Planning.  The complex will have 30 units total, with three designated for very low-income residents. Parking for 67 cars is on one level beneath the building.
Editor’s Update – 5pm: We stand corrected. The building will actually be five stories high along Wilshire, three stories tall in portions adjoining single-family homes on Bronson, and only two stories high along much of Crenshaw, to allow for a rooftop garden (that also increases the lot coverage to 60% versus the normal limit of 50%.) There will be 29 apartments, not 30. We hope to update the revised rendering of the building once we obtain it.
Hey, I agree with the design critique here, but where were the dissenting voices when these developers proposed this piece of junk? Also, is this just outside of the oh-so-discriminating ParkMile (which features such handsome residential buildings as the one that desecrates the memory of Perino’s)…..it seems to me we continue to all stand by as worse and worse designs are allowed to destroy what should be one of the main and beautiful boulevards of our city. It’s not the density of the building that is the problem, it’s the absolute lack of intelligence and beauty in design
Very discouraging. Who is looking out for the “Park” aspect of the Park Mile? Fenced mini-lawns are a “bonus” for no one except developers, whose sole creativity seems to be in finding new ways to maximize their profits at the expense of Park Mile residents.
I do think that buildings like this should make people re-think whatever purpose the Park Mile plan ever had, or throw it out and start over. All it seems to do is make sure that anyone who lives in the Park Mile has no reason to walk to Wilshire, since any thing but residential is forbidden. But whatever pretentions the advocates of Park Mile had toward making the area beautiful are being destroyed by the stupid and cheap design that the developers seem to always deliver (with the Park Mile’s approval).
Why is the owner of this building hiding behind an LLC? Googling 4180 Wilshire LLC turns up the name Eugene Leydiker, who works for Hankey Investment Co., a developer that owns two Park Mile office buildings at Wilshire and Hudson: 4751 Wilshire and 4727 Wilshire. They list those on their site, why not 4180?
Are these low income housing and where i put in for application