Past Perfect: How LAAC Reinvented Itself for the Future

Facilities Management
during his formative years), Walt Disney,
and Mack Sennett among its membership, it
seems logical that management employed an
element of screenwriting technique to steer its
rebranding efforts. LAAC’s renovation team
created a character to personify the clientele
they hoped to reach. They gave him a job;
they knew where he lived.
“We saw him as a serial tech entrepreneur
who lived in the Eastern Columbia Building
[a 1930 Art Deco landmark],” says LAAC
Assistant General Manager Cory Hathaway.
“From there, we built out 10 action items that
would most appeal to this person.”
These items would eventually become
distilled into every management renovation
decision, from the type of beer featured at
the club’s restaurant/bar to the colors and
surfaces for The Blue Room, a centerpiece
of the LAAC’s revitalization. A whimsical
speakeasy reimagined by British designer
Timothy Oulton, the Blue Room’s only
access is through a card-keyed door embedded
in a faux book case. If you’re sharpeyed
enough to find the door, a “hidden”
Prohibition-era staircase lined with vintage
photos leads up to the room itself. With
every step, members literally walk through
the club’s history.
“We thought the ‘secret’ staircase added
an air of intrigue that would appeal to our
character,” Hathaway says.
COLLABORATING WITH MEMBERS
The LAAC membership is a highly vested
community with a longstanding tradition
of participation in club improvements (one
club president famously sold off his living
room furnishings to help pay the LAAC’s
bills during the Great Depression). So
naturally, members were involved in the
planning process.
To introduce the renovations, members
were invited into a specially created Discovery
Center. This showroom featured design
boards for the project, renderings of the new
spaces, locker samples, and a timeline for the
construction of each area. (The 18-month
project was broken into three, six-month
segments, which allowed continuous access to
the existing locker rooms.) LAAC members
were encouraged to leave their own suggestions
for management to review.
Club leadership also took advantage of
the expertise of members in the project.
While LAAC has never had a standing
design committee, it keeps a select group of
member creatives in a shallow orbit. This
way, their expertise can be tapped for idea
generation from time to time. Members
with professional skills in interior design,
cocktail consulting, and photography all
contributed to LAAC’s renovation.
PURPOSEFUL REPURPOSING
The club’s heritage, which others might
have thoughtlessly pushed aside, was
wholeheartedly embraced by management
as a competitive advantage. This new breed
of tastemakers and tech cognoscenti were
living and playing in ironclad, carvedstone
spaces from the trolley-car era. With
its current 12-story location opening the
same year as the launch of the Titanic, the
Photo courtesy of Cory Hathaway
Top: Members now have a crisp and modern place
to shower after a day at the club. Bottom: The shower
stalls prior to the renovation were functional, but felt
and looked institutional.
Photo courtesy of Josh Telles
20 CLUB MANAGEMENT