Broadway-Spring Arcade Building
The Broadway-Spring Arcade Building in Los Angeles was built in 1924 on the site of Mercantile Place, a small alley lined with retail shops that had been an L.A. landmark for more than forty years. Architects Kenneth McDonald and Maurice Couchot won the competition to find a suitable design that would provide office space as well as maintain the alley’s storefronts and ambience. The three-level glass-roofed shopping arcade, in imitation of the Burlington Arcade in London, connects two twelve-story office towers, one facing Broadway, one facing Spring Street. The exterior features intricate Spanish Baroque terracotta arches that rise up over the arcade entrances. The building, listed simply as the Arcade Building, is a contributing structure to the Broadway Theater and Commercial District on the National Register of Historic Places.
Los Angeles, Los Angeles County
Photographers: John Bare, Andrew Schmidt