Before the Ace Hotel opened in 2014, hospitality growth in Downtown Los Angeles (DTLA) was largely confined to the Financial District—home to nightlife-centric the Standard, along with the area surrounding L.A. Live, the entertainment complex that debuted in 2007. Broadway, one of downtown’s oldest streets, was once a thriving, cultural magnet, known for its cluster of glittering movie palaces. Despite decades of neglect, Jon Blanchard, cofounder and CEO of BLVD Companies, foresaw a rebirth for Broadway and spearheaded the Ace’s conversion of the historic United Artists building.
His partner, Nicolo Rusconi, joined him in 2014, and since then, the duo has been responsible for some of DTLA’s most notable and ambitious projects. Today, their LA- and Chicago-based firm encompasses real estate development, investment, and asset management. Beyond hotels, they also have two fast-casual Chicas Tacos restaurants in LA.
Chicas Tacos in Downtown LA
Before founding BLVD in 2010, Blanchard started out designing and constructing high-end single-family homes, restaurants, and bars in LA, while Rusconi worked with his father, a farmer-turned-foodservice distributor, whose office is located in DTLA. After meeting through mutual friends, Rusconi and Blanchard found they shared a common passion for “acquiring adaptive reuse buildings and converting them into modern day usable hotel spaces,” says Blanchard.
DTLA serves as the hub of their operation and emphasizes their common goal to revitalize beautiful, old buildings. “[The neighborhood] created this serendipitous opportunity for Jon and I to connect,” says Rusconi. “One of the things that resonated most passionately with both of us was walking around and seeing all these buildings that were abandoned but held so much potential. We were equally inspired to bring back the timelessness of what Downtown LA was in the early 20th century.”
Although Blanchard and Rusconi were initially deemed “lunatics” for taking a gamble on a then run-to-the-ground Broadway, Ace, with its forward-thinking mentality, was an ideal collaborator. Based on the hotel’s success, brands like Freehand, NoMad, and InterContinental followed, making their own marks on downtown.
BLVD introduced an outpost of the Hoxton to the same corridor last year. This renovation of the 1920s Los Angeles Railway Building, the one-time headquarters of the LA streetcar system, yielded glamorous Old-World surprises, including original marble and a hidden staircase graced with stained glass. From the rooftop of the Hoxton, there’s a “view straight down the corridor that shows the push to bring back more neon and Hollywood vibrancy to Broadway,” says Rusconi. “Jon and I watched it materialize since we stood up there for the first time in 2012.”
Rich colors and textures enrich the lobby at the Hoxton, Downtown LA
As champions of DTLA, BLVD is busy with other high-profile adaptive reuse projects in the neighborhood, including a forthcoming citizenM, the first high-rise modular construction ever approved in the city. The firm also had a hand in last year’s arrival of Soho Warehouse, Soho House’s newest West Coast edition, set in a 1916 building in downtown’s Arts District that was once home to a plumbing supply company.
Having been embedded in the lifestyle hotel sphere all these years, inevitably, BLVD is hatching plans for its own select service-meets-boutique concept—what Blanchard and Rusconi playfully dub selectique. With less of a focus on of-the-moment F&B outlets and more on fostering a “space that is warm, homey, and inviting,” says Blanchard, it will “give folks from all walks of life a good experience for a reasonable price.”
Rooftop restaurant Pilot at the Hoxton, Downtown LA overlooks Broadway
Guestrooms at the Hoxton, Downtown LA feature chevron floors and burl wood elements
