In a local commercial real estate market that is decidedly cool, there is one big hot spot: Santa Monica and its environs. So many tech firms – 1,400 in all – have flocked there that occupancy rates are virtually 100 percent in some neighborhoods and lease rates are above $4 a square foot, the highest in Los Angeles County. This rapidly growing cluster of social media firms, mobile-content creators and other tech startups – as well as ancillary firms of venture capitalists, lawyers and the like – are expanding the footprint of what’s generally called Silicon Beach all the way south to Playa Vista. That community is where architect Carlos Carrasquillo, below, is transforming a former Postal Service distribution center into creative offices for developers Shorenstein Properties and Worthe Real Estate Group. Of course, Carrasquillo is but one player in the larger transformation of the Westside beach communities into a tech mecca. There are many others – developers, brokers, architects and tech executives – who are intent not on making more corporate structures with their cubicle farms and mahogany-lined corner offices, but on making creative space where L.A.’s techies can feel free to experiment. This Who’s Who in Real Estate Special Report profiles 13 standouts who are creating all this creative office space.

Wayne Ratkovich,
Lawrence N. Field,
Jeffrey E. Palmer,
Avesta Rasouli,
Randy Starr,
Jim Jacobsen,
Matthew Miller,
Jeff Pion,
Carlos Carrasquillo,
Michael White,
Brandon Beck,
Marc Merrill,
Josh Berman