Brookfield Properties has completed the first phase of its renovation of the California Market Center in Downtown Los Angeles, the company announced last week.
The complex - which spans a full city block bounded by 9th Street, Main Street, Los Angeles Street, and Olympic Boulevard - consists of 1.85 million square feet of space in a trio of mid-rise buildings. Initially developed in the early 1960s, the property has long been hub for the wholesale apparel industry.
The first phase of the renovation, announced in late 2018, builds off of the center's history. Brookfield has consolidated the building's fashion tenants into a single building, comprising over 600,000 square feet of showroom and event space. Each floor is dedicated to different product categories, with tenants that include FILA, PUMA, Little Marc Jacobs, and Native Shoes.
The broader overhaul of California Market Center, designed by Gensler, will reclad two existing buildings with floor-to-ceiling glass windows, add new skybridges connecting the property at all levels, and convert a rooftop area into a tenant amenity space.
At ground-level, plans call for opening the fortress-like complex to the street by clearing a standalone building at the corner of 9th and Main to create a 13,700-square-foot landscaped plaza. Brookfield also intends to add 150,000 square feet of ground-floor retail and restaurant space to the property.
Completion of the second phase of construction is anticipated in mid-2021.
Brookfield, which purchased a controlling stake in California Market Center in 2017, is the largest office landlord in the Downtown area. The New York-based firm is currently renovating the atrium of the Wells Fargo Center tower complex on Bunker Hill, and broke ground last year on a high-rise apartment building adjacent to the Figat7th shopping mall.
The property sits across Main Street from Broadway Palace, a large apartment complex completed by developer Geoffrey Palmer in 2018.
South across Olympic Boulevard, Jamison Services, Inc. - which formerly operated California Market Center - has received entitlements to convert an annex to the complex into a hotel.
