As we've suspected, the fate of the Hollywood Palladium is now up in the air, the L.A. Times reports.
According to the paper, Combined Properties Inc. is in the process of buying the 66-year-old landmark for around $65 million, and hopes to build residences, stores and even a hotel on its parking lot. But what this means for the aging Sunset Boulevard landmark is a mystery.
Coincidentally, the Palladium plays a large role in the upcoming NBC drama "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," from Aaron Sorkin. The theatre for the show's fictional "Saturday Night Live"-style sketch comedy series is actually the Palladium -- while the building that plays the headquarters for the show's fictional "NBS" network is in real life the next-door tower (home to the House of Blues and a Coffee Bean that closes down way too early each night).
Details from the Times:
The Palladium has been a shining piece of Hollywood history. It was built by former film producer Maurice M. Cohen on the site of the original Paramount Studio. His ambition was to create a music mecca where ordinary Angelenos could see top celebrities.
Among those ready to fight for the Palladium is the Los Angeles Conservancy, Executive Director Linda Dishman said.
The building does not have official landmark status, she said, but it was designed by noted Los Angeles architect Gordon Kaufman, who also designed Santa Anita Park in Arcadia.
"Hollywood is known internationally as an entertainment capital, so it is important to keep venues that continue to serve that use," Dishman said. "The Palladium still has a very active place in entertainment today."
The current owner, Palladium Investors Ltd., didn't respond to requests for comment, but President Alan Shuman acknowledged to the Los Angeles Business Journal last week that a sale was being discussed.
Development on the Palladium block on Sunset between Argyle Avenue and El Centro Avenue has been expected, said real estate broker Steven Tronson of Ramsey-Schilling Co., because the district around nearby Vine Street has seen a recent burst of activity. More than $1.2 billion in development including condos, stores, apartments and a hotel are planned or underway.
Meanwhile... we met former L.A. Conservancy bigwig Ken Bernstein (above) while putting together the Ambassador Hotel wake earlier this year. Bernstein has since left the org, and is now the City of Los Angeles' first manager of the office of historic resources.
The L.A. Times profiles Bernstein in today's paper:
When the Ambassador Hotel was demolished late last year, Ken Bernstein grieved for the loss. But Bernstein, then the head of preservation issues for the Los Angeles Conservancy, also knew that the group had put up a good fight in trying to retain at least parts of the main hotel building as a new school complex is built there.
Now, after eight years at the conservancy, Bernstein is switching camps. He recently became the city of Los Angeles' first manager of the office of historic resources, a new part of the Planning Department that consolidates previously scattered responsibilities for preservation issues at a time of growing development and population pressures. Among his tasks will be to lead the city's first full survey of historic and architecturally significant sites, a mammoth, five-year project partly funded by the Getty Foundation.
Bernstein says the loss of the Ambassador still stings, but that it ignited a new awareness in Angelenos when it comes to historic building preservation:
"Certainly the demolition of the Ambassador was a huge disappointment, but in many ways I think it galvanized the preservation community. Because it has been a long time since we suffered a major loss in the city of that significance, much in the way New York City's preservation community was galvanized by the Penn Station demolition in the '60s … I think historic preservation has been on the minds and lips of Angelenos in a way over the past several years that wasn't necessarily true previously.
"The remaining challenge and one of the reasons I was interested in coming over to the city is that in many ways the city's own preservation program has lagged behind the private and grass-roots activity."
Personally, I think it's time to throw our attention over to Columbia Square, which could disappear within the next year if we're not careful. Look for more on that end shortly.
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