City National Plaza

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City National Plaza is a twin tower skyscraper complex on South Flower Street in western Downtown Los Angeles, California. It was originally named ARCO Plaza upon opening in 1972.

Video City National Plaza

History

Richfield Tower

The present complex is on the site of the landmark Richfield Tower, that was designed in the Art Deco style by Morgan, Walls & Clements, and completed in 1929. It was the headquarters of the Atlantic Richfield Oil company. It was demolished in 1969.

ARCO Plaza

The current skyscraper complex was built as the ARCO Plaza, with a pair of 213.3 m (700 ft) 52-story office towers. One became the new world headquarters for the Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO), the present day The Paul Hastings Tower. An underground shopping complex was accessed by open escalators from the street level plaza.

Upon completion in 1972, the ARCO Plaza towers were the tallest buildings in the city for one year before being overtaken by Aon Center, and were the tallest twin towers in the world until the completion of the World Trade Center in New York City. The towers are the tallest twin buildings in the United States outside of New York City, where the 55-floor Time Warner Center stands at 750 ft (230 m).

In 1986, joint owners ARCO and Bank of America sold the buildings to Shuwa Investments Corp., the American subsidiary of Shuwa Co. of Tokyo, for $650 million while both remained tenants in their respective named towers. Shuwa later sold the property in 2003 to Thomas Properties Group and other investors for $270 million.

The towers are constructed of steel frames covered with polished panels of forest green granite and panes of bronze glass, however, in 2016, the exterior of the top two floors and the service roof of The Paul Hastings Tower were modified on the north, east, and south flanks to house their upgraded headquarters and offices. This modification features silver trim and panes of light green glass panels.