Beny Alagem’s posh Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills and iconic Beverly Hilton will soon add another deluxe neighbor now that a luxury residential project has a deal to add an Aman resort to its lineup.
Alagem Capital Group has spent the past two years planning One Beverly Hills as a garden-like residential complex next to the Beverly Hilton, just off the intersection of Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards. Plans now include the ultra-luxe Aman, a magnet for billionaire guests from Bill Gates to Mark Zuckerberg, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Alagem Capital will partner with London-based Cain International on the project on a 17.5-acre chunk of land fronting Wilshire.
Alagem bought the former site of Robinsons-May department store in 2018 for $445 million. One Beverly Hills, announced in 2020, has city approval for a 42-room hotel with only luxury suites and 37 hotel-branded condominiums.
The Switzerland-based Aman will operate the 10-story hotel, private club, spa, restaurant and Aman-branded condos next to the Beverly Hilton hotel.
The Beverly One complex is designed by Norman Foster, an English lord known for designing the lipstick-like skyscraper in London known as the Gherkin and the hoop-shaped Apple headquarters in Cupertino.
Plans also call for up to 340 upscale condominiums in two towers as high as 32 stories, surrounded by 8 acres of native plant gardens, paths and water features.
The hotel would be set back from Wilshire Boulevard, partly on land formerly occupied by a 76-brand gas station that the developers acquired.
Cain and Alagem Capital partnered in 2018 and received city entitlements to build One Beverly Hills in 2021. The Beverly Hills City Council approved the project over the objection of Councilmember and former Mayor John Mirisch, who called the proposed development “elitist, exclusive and exclusionary.”
“Without affordable housing, the project has turned into a castle-fortress of exclusion,” Mirisch told the other four council members.
Construction is expected to begin in 2023 and be completed in 2027, said Jonathan Goldstein, chief executive of Cain International.
Partners Cain and Alagem have hired Larry Green, formerly the head of U.S. development for Westfield malls, to oversee development. Among the large projects Green has shaped was the 2017, $1-billion makeover of nearby Westfield Century City.
Aman operates 33 properties in 20 countries. The Beverly Hills hotel will be its fifth in the U.S. after Aman opens establishments in New York in August and in Miami in 2024.
[Los Angeles Times] – Dana Bartholomew