This Week's LA Deal Sheet

Luxury grocer Erewhon will open a new location on South Lake Avenue in Pasadena at the site of a former Borders bookstore. 

The design firm RDC revealed plans last week for the new store at 475 South Lake Ave. An investment group associated with Erewhon — 475 South Lake LLC — closed escrow on the building in November, paying $16.18M, public records show.

The nearly 42K SF building opened in 1949 as an outpost of the high-end department store I. Magnin and was later converted into a Borders location, which shuttered nearly a decade ago.

RDC and Erewhon will transform the space with a projected December 2023 opening, RDC said. Erewhon will share the space with two other tenants: childcare service Brella and women’s healthcare clinic Tia. 

Erewhon is in expansion mode with a new location in Studio City, and two more in the works at the Culver Steps and in Beverly Hills, according to RDC. The Beverly Hills location is expected to open in summer 2022, followed by Culver City that same year, according to the Los Angeles Times. The company is also eyeing DTLA and Glendale locations, as well as markets outside of LA County for the first time in decades, the LA Times reported.

PEOPLE

The Hollywood Partnership, the nonprofit that manages the Hollywood Entertainment District, announced it will appoint a new president and CEO, Kathleen Rawson. Rawson’s appointment is effective Feb. 21. Rawson is currently the CEO of Downtown Santa Monica, a nonprofit that manages services in downtown Santa Monica and manages the downtown’s business assessment district.   

SALES

The midcentury El Porto Building, a fixture of Manhattan Beach’s main street, sold for $9.21M. The roughly 11K SF mixed-use building at 312 Rosecrans Ave. is four blocks from the beach and holds ground-floor commercial space and second-floor residential apartments. It was built in 1953.

Kidder Mathews’ Tanel Harunzade, Darrell Levonian and Brittney McCarthy represented the buyer, 6030 Wilshire LLC. Kidder Mathews’ Ryan Sharpe represented the seller, Chang El Porto LLC.

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Onni Group bought a historic building and potential development site in Hollywood, paying $40M, Commercial Observer reported. The property, called Romaine + Sycamore, includes about 67K SF of creative space and a 100-car parking lot. The space is mostly vacant, according to CO, though there are five tenants on month-to-month leases. Onni’s plans for the site are not yet known, the property was being marketed as a development opportunity for potential studio space or offices for post-production, gaming, medical or life sciences uses. 

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Waterford Property Co. and the California Statewide Communities Development Authority purchased three Escondido apartment complexes as additions to their roster of properties for moderate-income households. The acquisitions together total 314 units and are the first San Diego-area properties that the partnership has acquired. Waterford, which acts as the property administrator, holds a portfolio of 15 multifamily properties in its Southern California essential housing portfolio. The properties are the Alcove Apartments at 650 North Centre City Parkway; the Haven76 Apartments at 2414 South Escondido Blvd.; and the Rowan Apartments at 700 West Grand Ave.

LEASES

Greycroft Partners, a New York-based venture capital firm, signed a lease for 19.5K SF at an under-construction office project in Downtown Los Angeles’ Arts District, CBRE announced. CBRE’s Phillip Ruhl represented Greycroft and John Zanetos represented the landlord, a private local investment partnership. Greycroft rented space at FreeMarket at 821 Traction Ave. The 40K SF project will feature office space on the second floor, ground-floor retail and private outdoor space for tenants. The property is expected to be complete in March 2022; Greycroft plans to move in at that time.