By Charly SHELTON

Many residents and visitors to Glendale have noticed the long vacant, tall, white building across the street from the Americana at Brand: The Masonic Temple. School children who grew up in the area may have visited it to see productions from the theater company, A Noise Within. Every few years, a rumor would start to circulate that it was slated for demolition and the site would become something else. Finally the years of dilapidation and rumors have come to an end.

Caruso Affiliated, the real estate development company behind The Grove, The Americana at Brand, The Lakes at Thousand Oaks and several other shopping centers and apartment buildings, has applied its distinct design and service toward a new project – renovating the Masonic Temple and making it into a state-of-the-art office building.

Built in 1929, the Masonic Temple was the meeting place for the Glendale branch of the Freemasons but has been largely vacant for the last several decades. A Noise Within theatre company operated out of the Temple from 1991 to 2011, but that’s about it. At nine stories tall, it dominated the skyline of 1929 Glendale along with the spire from the Alex Theatre, which was designed by the same architect, Arthur Lindley. It is a great example of classic Art Deco architecture both inside and out. Many in Glendale agreed it would be a shame to lose such a beautiful building if it was demolished.

It is with this thought that Caruso Affiliated acquired the building in February 2015 and renovation and construction was completed in 10 months. What resulted is a state-of-the-art office for CBRE, a fortune 300 company and one of the largest real estate companies in the world, as well as retail and food service opportunities on the ground level. The construction and renovation was specifically targeted to preserve the historic nature of the building, with exposed steel support girders and refurbished interior ceiling arches, while enabling a productive office workspace for the modern company. CBRE is 100% address free, meaning employees can set up at any computer, on any floor, anywhere in the building and log into their remote virtual desktop. And with the top six floors of the building as CBRE’s office space, employees have a lot to choose from.

Caruso Affiliated also offers concierge benefits to the employees of the building. The concierge in the lobby can pick up lunch, go shopping, buy groceries, wash cars, fill cars with gas, acquire concert tickets – anything that employees would normally have to do after work, which will save them time in their daily lives and allow for their “off time” to be spent actually at leisure or with their families.

There are still slots available on the first three floors for other tenants who may want to establish offices. The ground floor will have retail opportunities including Shake Shack, a highly anticipated burger and shake restaurant. There are also plans for opening another as yet unnamed business in the basement and second floor mezzanine. For more information on the Masonic Temple, visit carusoaffiliated.com.

  Charly Shelton