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Long Beach architectural firm Studio One Eleven has released fresh renderings for its design of a proposed 21-story after first releasing a rendering last year, showcasing a 203-unit residential tower that is also set to include 13 affordable units at 615 E. Ocean Blvd.
Taking over the parking lot and building where Long Beach Cafe used to be before closing mid-pandemic in 2020, the geometrical, protrustion-brick design will reach some 257 feet in the air (slightly above the 240 limit for which it will ask for an exemption) should it not only reach entitlement at today’s Planning Commission meeting but also find the capital to break ground.
“I’m excited to see an abandoned, underutilized site that will be transformed into dense housing to further activate our downtown,” said Studio One Eleven Principal Michael Bohn. “In terms of innovation the project proposes mechanized parking and the building’s open space is dispersed and articulated at grade, mid-level and the roof.”
A Closer Look at the 21-Story Tower Design
The tower will be flanked by the 17-story Current complex to its east and the historic, eight-story Artaban condo complex to its west and welcomes a much needed dose of diversity in a downtown that is becoming increasingly slathered in steel and glass design.
The project calls for 261 parking spots for cars and 41 spots for bicycles in a building that will have 24 studio apartments (three of which will be affordable), 96 one-bedroom apartments (six of which will be affordable), 76 two-bedroom apartments (four of which will be affordable), and seven three-bedroom apartments. About a third of those apartments will have balconies.
Amenities include outdoor decks, a rooftop pool, a fitness center, lounge rooms, a game room, and a club room.
The parcel was listed for sale and went into escrow in 2021 for $6.25M after Long Beach Cafe, the Greek-meets-American diner opened by brothers Nick and George Stanitsas in 1988, shuttered.
The loss of the space is bittersweet: On one hand, it waves au revoir to one of DTLB’s few old-school diners in a very formal way but also welcomes some much-needed housing units in a space that was (outside the nostalgia) inefficient in the name of a downtown area.
That rendering is so misleading, the building next to it called the Current is 17 stories, only 4 shorter than what’s proposed, not half the size. They are talking a lot of liberties showing how it has unobstructed views.