Guaranty Building
- Style
- Beaux-Arts
- City
- Los Angeles, CA
The Guaranty Building is a Beaux-Arts high-rise at 6331 Hollywood Boulevard, built in 1923 by the Guaranty Building and Loan Association of Los Angeles under general manager Gilbert Beesemyer, with Charlie Chaplin and Cecil B. DeMille among its investors. Designed by John C. Austin and Frederic M. Ashley, the team behind Griffith Observatory and the Memorial Branch Library, it was appraised at $1,325,000 on completion.
the building
Hollywood tenant roster. Early tenants included Charlie Chaplin, Cecil B. DeMille, Hedda Hopper, Al Jolson, and Rudolph Valentino, making the building a working address for some of the biggest names in 1920s Hollywood.
the style
The building's Beaux-Arts facade brought an academic, classically ordered formality to Hollywood Boulevard, a style favored for the era's prestige office buildings.
More on Beaux-Artsthe architect
John C. Austin and Frederic M. Ashley worked as a design team responsible for some of Los Angeles's most recognizable civic buildings, including Griffith Observatory and the Memorial Branch Library; the Guaranty Building was among their Hollywood commercial commissions.
significance
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the building was hit hard by the Great Depression: its owner, the Guaranty Building and Loan Association, declared bankruptcy in 1930, an event with ripple effects across the region. It is now owned by the Church of Scientology.
nearby
- Earl Carroll Theatre
- Hollywood Plaza Hotel
- Leed's Building
- Hallmark Building
- United States Post Office
- Los Angeles Fire Department Museum and Memorial