Real estate investor E. Clem Wilson commissioned this thirteen story tower at the gateway to the Miracle Mile in the late 1920s, engaging the firm Meyer and Holler to design what would become their final work. The same firm that had created the fantastical Grauman's Chinese Theatre and Egyptian Theatre delivered something entirely different here: restrained Art Deco corporate elegance replacing their signature theatrical showmanship. The building opened just as the Great Depression bankrupted Meyer and Holler, closing a career that spanned more than 200 Los Angeles area buildings. Its completion in this economic collapse captures the precise moment the Roaring Twenties architectural boom came to an abrupt halt.
The tower rises as one of the finest examples of Art Deco design in Los Angeles, stacking a relatively slender, stepped form above a broad two story retail base. This massing provided ground floor commercial space along Wilshire Boulevard while giving upper floor office workers the height and prestige of a true tower. Limestone cladding wraps the exterior, with geometric setbacks at multiple heights creating usable terraces. The original Art Deco lobby remains intact despite a 1954 ground floor retail remodel by Welton Becket.
