THE BUILDING

Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #294

"Eastern Columbia, Broadway at Ninth" - over several decades, the city's airwaves chimed this jingle to advise Los Angeles shoppers of new arrivals and special offers at Downtown's flagship department store. For years the tallest building on the area skyline, the Eastern Columbia Outfitting Company opened on September 12, 1930.

Perhaps Los Angeles' finest example of the Art Deco era's zig zag moderne style, the Claude Beelman-designed tower has long captivated arts and architecture scholars. Faced in turquoise terra cotta and trimmed with deep blue and gold terra cotta, the tower's façade features sunburst patterns, geometric shapes, zigzags, chevrons and other stylized motifs. A four-sided clock tower emblazoned in neon with the name EASTERN caps its thirteen stories.

After retail operations ceased in 1957, Eastern Columbia was transformed into studio and office space for local garment businesses and arts organizations. Among the tenants: the Los Angeles Conservancy and West Coast swimwear icon Jantzen. In fact, just up until residential conversions began, a fashion runway blazed through the building's eleventh floor. From retail palace to creative workplace to timeless residence: it's a fitting evolution for Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #294.