A familiar Westwood office tower is on track for a serious identity change. Landlord Douglas Emmett has filed plans to turn the 17-story building at 10900 Wilshire Boulevard into housing, asking the city to convert roughly 247,000 square feet of office space into about 199 one- and two-bedroom apartments, while replacing a surface parking lot with a seven-story residential building that would add another 124 units. Ground-floor commercial space would stay in place, and the site would continue to offer parking for roughly 416 vehicles near the busy Wilshire-Westwood intersection.
What's planned
The filing with the city lays out a two-building approach. The existing 17-story high-rise would undergo an adaptive-reuse conversion, and a new seven-story structure would rise on the property’s southern parking lot. As reported by Urbanize LA, the tower overhaul is expected to yield 199 apartments, while the ground-up building would deliver another 124, for a total of roughly 323 homes. Plans keep retail at the tower’s street level and consolidate parking into both new and existing structures to accommodate about 416 vehicles.
Developer timeline and design
On its development page, Douglas Emmett describes the effort as a two-phase conversion that will result in roughly 320 apartment residences and a new amenity package that includes a pool and fitness center. Company investor materials indicate construction is slated to start this year, with the tower converted floor by floor while the new Ashton Avenue building follows as a second phase. The firm is presenting the Westwood project as part of a broader play to reposition underused Westside office space into multifamily housing.
Transit and policy context
The property sits next to a future stop on Metro’s D Line extension at Wilshire and Westwood, a link that should make car-light living on the Westside a more realistic option. LA Metro’s project page notes that Section 3 of the D Line is planned to serve Westwood and the VA campus, and that construction continues across the corridor. At the policy level, the City’s 2021–2029 Housing Element, along with recent rezoning moves and adaptive-reuse ordinances, is explicitly geared toward encouraging office-to-housing conversions, according to the Department of City Planning.
Why developers are converting Wilshire towers
Office-to-residential plans have picked up steam across Los Angeles as high vacancy, soft demand and tighter financing make older office buildings harder to justify as pure workspace. A national snapshot based on RentCafé data shows a rapidly growing pipeline of conversion projects, as summarized by Multifamily Executive. Along Wilshire, local activity is not just theoretical. Recent financing for Jamison Properties’ Koreatown office remake, detailed in a Koreatown office tower lifeline, suggests at least some conversion proposals are now pushing toward actual construction.
Next steps and neighborhood review
The entitlement request will now move through the Department of City Planning, where it faces public review, environmental analysis and multiple discretionary approvals before any work can kick off. According to Urbanize LA, neighborhood groups, the local Council office and transit planners are all expected to weigh in as the proposal advances.
