TASTEARBITER
W H E N T H E E Y E K N O W S
W H E N T H E E Y E K N O W S
How Cleopatra Gave Birth to the Century Plaza Hotel
Tom Mix, a cowboy star of the silent‐film era, purchased a large parcel of low rolling grasslands approximately ten miles west of downtown Los Angeles in the early 1900s which would later become Century City. In 1925, Mix sold his ranch to William Fox, owner of the Fox Studio Corporation, who used it as a backlot. In 1935, Fox Film Corporation merged with Twentieth Century Pictures to become Twentieth Century Fox.
By the late 1950s the company was in financial trouble. In an effort to restore a severely damaged balance sheet caused by a series of over budget and money loosing projects such as Cleopatra, 20th Century Fox explored the possibility of developing the backlot. Incidentally, Cleopatra began filming in 1961 and took two and half years to complete. The movie finally broke even in 1973, ten years following its release in July of 1963.
New York real estate developer William Zeckendorf paid $5 million for a six‐month option on the property. In 1961, in partnership with Alcoa Properties, Inc., Zeckendorf purchased the 260‐acre site. In 1963, the joint venture was dissolved, and Alcoa Properties assumed complete ownership. That year demolition of the backlot began.
Alcoa retained american architect Welton Becket to oversee a new master plan; he developed a framework for buildings, landscaped boulevards, fountains, multi‐level plazas, bridges, and underground pedestrian concourses. The master plan divided the land into four quadrants. Becket is responsible for the design of many buildings in Los Angeles notably the Capitol Records Tower located at the corner of Hollywood and Vine.
Residential buildings were to be concentrated in the southeast quadrant, and the southwest quadrant was leased back to 20th Century Fox for its studio. The northern quadrants were dedicated primarily to commercial and office uses. The mixed‐used development was part of a larger trend in the area; in the 1960s several planned communities were developed in Los Angeles on previously undeveloped land.
However, unlike other developments, which focused primarily on low‐density, residential development, Century City was conceived of as a modern urban center for West Los Angeles, an urban environment where people can work, live, play and shop including a shopping center namely the Westfield Century City Shopping Centre, high‐rise office buildings such as the twin Century City Towers, residential dwellings, and a hotel.
Designed in 1963 by Seattle born architect Minoru Yamasaki (1912-1986) and constructed at a cost of $30 million, the crescent-shaped Century Plaza Hotel opened its doors in June 1966. Western International Hotels later renamed Westin Hotels and Resorts operated the property for many years. The Century Plaza Hotel was purchased in 2008 by the D.E. Shaw Group and Next Century Associates LLC, a subsidiary of Michael Rosenfeld's Woodridge Capital Partners.
The new ownership had plans to raze the hotel to make way for two mixed-use towers but were later abandoned when the Los Angeles Conservancy was successful in its effort to designate the Century Plaza a historical building.
The hotel was closed in 2016 to undergo a five-year restoration and redevelopment project costing $2.5 billion. When completed in 2021, the redeveloped property now includes two 44-story towers with 331 luxury units, a newly renovated 19-story Century Plaza Hotel boasting 400 rooms, 94,000 square feet of shops and restaurants.
The property was foreclosed in 2022 and will be auctioned off in February 2023. It is currently being operated as a Fairmont Hotel and is a member of Historic Hotels of America.
At a foreclosure sale held on April the 6th 2023, British billionaire siblings, David and Simon Reuben, acquired the Century Plaza development from Michael Rosenfeld for a bid of $1B representing an amount that is about 40% of the $2.5B it cost to build the Century City complex in Los Angeles.
