Wilshire Center, Los Angeles, California

Wilshire Center is a district that is part of the larger Mid-Wilshire district in the City of Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1895 by Gaylord Wilshire and is one of the oldest communities in Los Angeles. It is 3-4 miles west of downtown Los Angeles.

Because Wilshire Center has a large concentration of Korean residents and businesses, for practical purposes and in conversation the umbrella term "Koreatown" is usually used by residents to mean both Wilshire Center and the Koreatown (see also!) neighborhood just to the south. Technically, as defined by the Los Angeles Department of City Planning, Wilshire Community Plan, adopted September 19, 2001, Koreatown “is generally bounded by Eighth Street on the north, Twelfth Street on the south, Western Avenue on the west, and continues east towards Vermont Avenue,” and Wilshire Center “is generally bounded by 3rd Street on the north, 8th Street on the south, Hoover Street on the east, and Wilton Place on the west.” However, "Wilshire Center" signs are posted on southbound Normandie, Western and Vermont just south of Melrose, which contradict the 2001 Community Plan definition. Post offices accept 90004 zip code addresses as "Oakwood, CA" which might explain the discrepancy. Because of the unique historical character of Wilshire Center, this article refers only to the Community Plan definition.

Wilshire Center is a dense Regional Commercial Center of approximately convert|100|acre|km2|1. It includes high-rise office buildings, large hotels, regional shopping complexes, churches, entertainment centers, high-rise and low-rise apartment buildings, and, north of Sixth Street, private houses. It includes perhaps the largest number of historical buildings in Los Angeles outside Hollywood.

Within a one-mile (1.6 km) radius of Wilshire and Normandie (the approximate geographic center), there is a residential population of about 130,000 and a workforce of about 50,000.

Geography

Wilshire Center is bounded by Melrose Hill on the north, Westlake on the east, Koreatown on the south, and Hancock Park on the west.

Transportation

Wilshire Center is served by city buses, including several Rapid lines, and three LACMTA Purple Line subway stations along Wilshire Boulevard (at Vermont, Normandie, and Western). The Vermont station connects to the LACMTA Red Line which ends at North Hollywood.

The main east-west thoroughfare is Wilshire Boulevard, and the main north-south thoroughfares are Western Avenue and Vermont Avenue. Normandie is a minor north-south thoroughfare with a bus line. Third Street is a major east-west thoroughfare with a bus line, and 6th and 8th Streets are minor thoroughfares that function as alternatives to Wilshire for local driving.

The Hollywood Freeway (U.S. Route 101) runs just to the north and east of Wilshire Center. Access to the Santa Monica Freeway (Interstate 10) is about three miles (5 km) to the south.

History

Wilshire Boulevard got its name from millionaire socialist Henry Gaylord Wilshire, who in 1895 began developing 35 acres stretching westward from Westlake Park for an elite residential subdivision. Wilshire donated to the city a strip of land for a boulevard, on the conditions that it would be named for him and that railroad lines and commercial or industrial trucking would be banned.

In the early 1900s, steam-driven motorcars started sharing Wilshire Boulevard with horse-drawn carriages. At the turn of the century, Germain Pellissier raised sheep and barley between Normandie and Western Avenues. Reuben Schmidt purchased land east of Normandie for his dairy farm.

Apartment buildings

The first of the area's distinguished high-rise apartment buildings and hotels were erected along Wilshire Boulevard. The lavish Ambassador Hotel was built in 1921 on 23 acres of the former site of Reuben Schmidt's dairy farm. In approximately 1929, the Academy Awards ceremony was moved from the Hollywood Roosevelt to the Ambassador Hotel. It closed in 1989 and is now owned by the Los Angeles Unified School District, which is building schools and a small park on the site.

In 1921, Wilshire built the 14-story Apartment Hotel (now the Gaylord Apartments) facing the Ambassador. The area nearby became the site of elegant New York-style apartment buildings such as the Asbury, the Langham, the Fox Normandie, the Picadilly, the Talmadge (after Norma Talmadge), and the Windsor. Many film stars lived in these buildings.

As of 2008, expensive apartments and condominiums are being constructed in the area, and older office buildings are being converted into apartments and condos. The Metro stops at Wilshire/Western and Wilshire/Vermont both have new construction.

Commercial

Gloria Swanson's husband, Herbert Somborn, opened the Brown Derby Restaurant, a hat-shaped building at Wilshire and Alexandria in 1926. The hat has been recycled into a restaurant in a mini-mall.

In 1929, Bullocks Wilshire was built at Wilshire and Westmoreland as the city's first branch department store in the suburbs. It closed in 1993 and now houses the library of Southwestern Law School.

A section of Germain Pellessier's sheep farm became the site of the Pellessier Building and Wiltern Theatre, which began construction at the corner of Wilshire and Western in 1929. The theater, operated by Warner Brothers, opened in 1931.

In 1929, the Chapman Market drew motorcars to the world's first drive-through grocery store at Sixth St. and Alexandria.

I. Magnin's opened in 1939 at Wilshire and New Hampshire.

Office buildings

In 1952, on the driving range on the south side of Wilshire between Mariposa and Normandie was build the first three 12-story Tishman Plaza buildings in 1952 (they're now known as Central Plaza), designed by Claude Beelman.

Insurance companies began locating their west coast headquarters in Wilshire Center because of tax incentives provided by the State. Some 22 high rise office buildings were erected on Wilshire Boulevard from 1966 to 1976, to provide office space for such companies as Getty Oil Co., Ahmanson Financial Co., Beneficial Standard Life Insurance, Wausau and Equitable Life Insurance. The Chapman Park Hotel, built in 1936, was torn down to make way for the 34-story Equitable Plaza office building erected in 1969. By 1970, firms such as CNA, Pacific Indemnity and Pierce National Life were starting construction of their own high-rise buildings. Southwestern University School of Law moved from its downtown location of 50 years to a four-story campus just south of Wilshire Boulevard on Westmoreland in 1973.

In the 1970s and 1980s commerce moved to the City's less congested Westside as well as the San Fernando Valley, and businesses and affluent residents eventually followed. I. Magnin closed, while Bullocks Wilshire held out until 1993. Rental rates in office buildings plummeted from an average of $1.65/sq ft. to a dollar between 1991 and 1996; property values dropped from a high of $120/sq ft. to $30 or $40 per foot in 1998.Fact|date=December 2007

Wilshire Center lost the rest of its original glitter following the 1992 Los Angeles riots and the 1994 Northridge Earthquake.

The Wilshire Center Streetscape Project rejuvenated Wilshire Boulevard using federal funds. It was one of the most ambitious and significant urban rehabilitation projects found anywhere in America and was awarded in 1999 the Lady Bird Johnson Award from The National Arbor Day Foundation. New buildings include the Aroma Center on Wilshire and a retail building on the former parking lot of the Equitable Building.

Religious buildings

Wilshire Christian Church was the first church on Wilshire Boulevard in 1911. The church property at Wilshire and Normandie was donated by the Chapman Brothers, owners of Chapman Market, whose historic building remains nearby on Sixth Street.

The area is rich in grand religious buildings:
*Korean Philadelphia Presbyterian Church, on New Hampshire Avenue, formerly the Sinai Congregation
*The Los Angeles Korean Methodist Church, at 4th and Normandie, formerly a Christian Science congregation
* [http://www.immanuelpres.org/ Immanuel Presbyterian Church] (Wilshire & Berendo)
* [http://www.fccla.org/ First Congregational Church of Los Angeles] (6th & Commonwealth)
*St. James' in the City Episcopal Church on Wilshire
* [http://www.fbcofla.org/ First Baptist Church of Los Angeles] (8th & Westmoreland)
*St Basil's Catholic Church, a modern building, on Wilshire
*Founder's Church of Religious Science, on 6th Street
*Wilshire Boulevard Temple (Reform Jewish)
*The Islamic Center of Southern California, a modern building, on VermontThere are many smaller churches in the area, as well as Korean Buddhist temples.

Community organizations

*The [http://www.wilshirecenter.com/|Wilshire Center Business Improvement Corp.(WCBIC)]
*CRA Wilshire Center/Koreatown Citizen Advisory Committee (WCKCAC)
* [http://www.lacityneighborhoods.com/|The Wilshire Center/Koreatown Neighborhood Council (WCKNC)]

Education and services

Wilshire Center is zoned to the Los Angeles Unified School District. All areas are zoned to Los Angeles High School.

Schools include:
*Los Angeles Elementary School.
*Wilton Place Elementary School [http://www.wilshirecenter.com/live/schools.htm] .
*Berendo Middle School
*Burroughs Middle School

Private schools include Wilshire Private School about convert|2|mi|km west on the western border of Hancock Park. It is a KISC sponsored K-6 Academy.

The YMCA of Metropolitan Los Angeles is planning to build in 2008-2009 a small, full-service facility at Third and Oxford Streets [http://www.ymcala.org/Branch/Default.aspx?ENT=58] .

There are no city parks in Wilshire Center.

Nightlife

See article on Koreatown.

Gallery

References

*“Wilshire Boulevard Milestones," by Jane Gilman, publisher of "Larchmont Chronicle."
*The "Curating the City Tour Book" by the Los Angeles Conservancy
*“Streetscape: the Plan that Saved a Community” by David Wallace.
* [http://www.wilshirecenter.com/ Wilshire Center]
* [http://www.curatingthecity.org/ Tour of Wilshire Boulevard]