Downtown Landmark Purchased : Ira Yellin, partners, to spend $4 million to restore venerable Bradbury Building.

Developer Ira Yellin’s dream to make Broadway the focal point of downtown took another step toward reality last week with his purchase of the historic Bradbury Building, owned by the McKelvey family since 1943.

The 96-year-old city landmark at 304 S. Broadway, across the street from Yellin’s recently purchased Grand Central Market and the Million Dollar Building, closed escrow last Monday for slightly more than $8 million.

‘Monument Forever’

“We plan to keep the Bradbury a monument forever and will do major work, cleaning up the facade and the interior so it will be a polished gem when we’re finished,” Yellin said, estimating restoration cost at $4 million.

Alan Alexander, one of Yellin’s partners in the deal and his roommate at Harvard Law School 25 years ago, said that although ground-floor retail space is leased, offices in the five-story building have been empty for 18 months while seismic work was being done.

Elevators to Remain

“Now, we’ll do the interior with remodeling to be consistent with the building’s historic nature,” Alexander said.

The old caged elevators in the Romanesque-style building, designed by George Wyman, will remain, he said, “because they are like experiencing Europe in downtown L.A.”

The elevators, bathed in light filtered through a skylight, and the lace-like, wrought-iron railings in the building have attracted many film makers over the years. The 1982 movie “Blade Runner” was shot there.

The charm of the Bradbury, named for Lewis Bradbury, the mining millionaire-turned-real estate developer who built it, made it difficult for the McKelvey family to sell the building, said family member Dale Dougherty of Western Management Co.

“Grandfather started this company in 1934,” he said, “and the Bradbury Building was his first major investment. Everybody in the family is getting up in years, and they agreed three years ago to liquidate all holdings, but some wanted to sell the Bradbury, and some didn’t. Grandfather had the final say.”

Opportunity to Buy

Yellin said, “I was fortunate they came to me once they decided to sell and asked if I wanted to buy the Bradbury, saying they would give us the opportunity before they went public to market it. I went into escrow with two friends.” They were Alexander, a Century City attorney and member of the Beverly Hills City Council, and Jim Neal, an investment banker.

“The toughest obstacle was the timing,” Neal observed. Escrow closed on the Million Dollar Building on Dec. 30, and escrow opened on the Bradbury in January.

“During the last month,” Yellin said, “we met (local attorney) Sydney Irmas and his wife, Audrey, who love architecture and design. They became our financial partners.”

‘Grand Central Square’

Now Yellin and various partners control three of the city’s most important landmarks, which they are refurbishing to be part of what he calls “Grand Central Square,” with upscale restaurants and offices filled with lawyers, politicians and consultants spilling over from the Ronald Reagan State Office Building, being built at 3rd and Spring.

Yellin, who helped form a nonprofit group of merchants and developers known as “Miracle on Broadway,” admits that Grand Central Square is a lofty idea, since many offices on Broadway are empty, but said:

“When you think of Baltimore or other cities with a lot of urban renewal, you will see that it’s the historic buildings that make a city a place where people want to walk around. We have that kind of potential in this part of town.”