The Cosmo Lofts conversion of a 1920’s furniture warehouse into modern live work lofts for rent has embodied the revival of an historic part of Los Angeles: Hollywood.


The area’s entertainment origin began in 1911 when the Nestor Company opened Hollywood's first film studio in an old tavern on the corner of Sunset and Gower. Not long thereafter Cecil B. DeMille and D. W. Griffith began making movies in the area drawn to the community for its open space and moderate climate.


The needs of this thriving new industry created radical changes in the community causing a clash between older and newer residents. Acres of agricultural land south of what-is-now Hollywood Boulevard were subdivided and developed as housing for the enormous numbers of workers that movie-making required.


High-rise commercial buildings began to spring up along Hollywood Boulevard and competing real-estate interests caused concentrations of development at Highland, Cahuenga, and at Vine. It wasn't long before nearly all the homes along the Boulevard were replaced by commercial buildings linking the three corners.


Banks, restaurants, clubs and movie palaces sprang up, catering to the demands of the burgeoning film industry during the 1920s and 1930s. The architectural styles of the buildings were representative of those most popular between the World Wars. Banks were typically designed in the more formal Beaux Arts styles, but other buildings in the community took on more playful personalities.


The ornamental Spanish Colonial Revival style reflected Hollywood's self-conscious extravagance while the new Art Deco and Moderne styles fit the community's aspirations for glamour and sophistication.


Hollywood has been anything but static, however, and after a few decades as the capital of film glamour, the neighborhood changed again. Although much of the studio work remained in Hollywood, many stars moved to Beverly Hills, and the elegant shops and restaurants left with them.


Hollywood today is a diverse, vital, and active community striving to preserve the elegant buildings from its past. Much of the movie industry remains in the area, although the neighborhood's outward appearance has changed.


In 1985, the Hollywood Boulevard commercial and entertainment district was officially listed in the National Register of Historic Places protecting the neighborhood's important buildings and seeing to it that the significance of Hollywood's past would always be a part of its future.


The Cosmo Lofts have sought to pay homage to Hollywood’s deep and eclectic past through the preservation of one of the area’s historic buildings. The juxtaposition between old and new embodies Hollywood’s progression and resurgence.