After converting downtown L.A.’s historic PacMutual building into sought-after creative space and selling it for $200 million last month, Houston real estate investment firm Lionstone Investments and downtown developer Rising Realty Partners will soon be at work on another old building downtown.
A partnership led by Lionstone bought One Bunker Hill, a 285,000-square-foot Class A office building at 601 W. Fifth St. from Goodwin Gaw of GAW Capital Partners in a deal that closed Tuesday, sources said. Rising will manage the property, which will be leased by Santa Monica firm Industry Partners. The sale price was not disclosed, and GAW declined to comment.
If the past is a precursor, Lionstone and Rising will reimagine the 14-story building, last renovated in the early 1990s, as a creative office campus.
Like the PacMutual building, One Bunker Hill has historic and architectural significance. Built in 1930, it was once home to the Southern California Edison Co. Building. It was one of the first buildings constructed in the Western United States to use all-electric heat and air conditioning, according to the Los Angeles Conservancy. The lower three stories of the Art Deco building are made out of solid limestone, and the entrance features figures sculpted by Merrell Gage that represent, light, power and hydroelectric energy.
Gaw has owned the property since 1999. Along with the likes of Tom Gilmore, he was part of the first downtown L.A. property investment boom in the late ’90s and early 2000s.
The property is 91 percent leased by tenants that include engineering consulting and construction management firm HNTB Corp., watering hole Bunker Hill Bar & Grill and law firm Scheper Kim & Harris, according to CoStar Group Inc.