Developer Drops Plan for Landmark Building

A lack of financing has thwarted a developer’s plan to transform the Eastern Star retirement home in Brentwood into a luxury hotel, and the landmark structure on Sunset Boulevard is once again on the market.

The 105-bed facility has served as a retirement home for more than 50 years for members of the Order of the Eastern Star, a Masonic organization.

The group plans to build another home for the 57 remaining residents on a 20-acre site it has purchased in Clovis, near Fresno. But Warren Wildman, former president of the order’s board of trustees, said it is necessary to sell the Brentwood home first before it can build the new home.

Tom McKinney, the new board president, said the group has been contacting people who had previously expressed interest in the property, and some have shown continued interest.

Santa Monica architect David Greenwood and his Monarch Star Partnership failed to exercise an option to buy the six-acre property under a purchase agreement struck with the Eastern Star Homes of California.

Greenwood said Wednesday that because of the economy, financing to refurbish the property has not been available. “I hope the building is preserved one way or another,” he said.

The home became a source of controversy in 1989 when it was declared a historic-cultural monument a month after it was put up for sale. The designation in effect limited the property’s uses by requiring a full environmental impact review before the home could be altered or demolished.

Many members of the Brentwood Homeowners Assn., the largest community group in the neighborhood, were receptive to Greenwood’s proposal because it called for preserving much of the existing building. Some members of the association organized a separate group, however, to fight the hotel concept, citing traffic concerns and a desire to keep the property residential.