And from the “They Sure Don’t Built ’em Like That Anymore” file comes the Pasadena Athletic Club at 425 E. Green St, corner of Los Robles St. I couldn’t find when it was built, but this photo is from 1926, back when they made buildings with unique character and atmosphere. The sign on the ground floor reads “Pacific Mortgage Company” and it looks like there could be other businesses on the ground floor. If this building is anything like the Hollywood Athletic Club on Sunset Blvd, it’s probably offered rooms as well as athletic facilities.
Here’s the same building from a different angle in 1930:
Bill B. says: “Another victim of the enormous cost relating to upgrades and remodeling for seismic, ADA, fire suppression, HVAC, asbestos abatement, water sewer and so on.”
Sadly the club was razed in 1978 to make way for Plaza Pasadena Mall, which itself was later razed. This is how the northwest corner of Green and Los Robles looks today. Yes. That’s right. A beige parking garage. This image is from June 2022.
I would love to see some vintage interior pics of the California Club
downtown. It’s all just mauve, teal and beige blandness now.
Yuk!!! What a piece of ——!!! Why does this keep happening? They would have been better off keeping the mall.
Martin quoted Bill B. as to why many of the buildings of yore have not survived. “Another victim of the enormous cost relating to upgrades and remodeling for seismic, ADA, fire suppression, HVAC, asbestos abatement, water sewer and so on.”
When the American Cinematheque took over the Egyptian in the ’90s the remodel cost $12.8 million. The NetFlix renovation cost $70 million. Most places from the past are not going to survive the building standards of the present unless money is plentiful or safety is of no concern.
Sobering figures. So sad.
Is it just me, or is it true that in the majority of your before and after shots, the after is often simply a parking lot, or garage, as in this case?
No, Mary, it’s not just you!
Transformations like this diminish our urban built environment and impoverish us.
So sad that these beautiful buildings are torn down. The new ones they put in their place are a sorry imitation. Such a shame.
What is truly pathetic is that Los Angeles has lost hundreds of historically architectural buildings for car “storage”… ie. a parking lot or parking garage! And considering that most cars are only used on average 2-3 hours per day, that’s a lot of cars parked for most of “their” lifetime, while we sacrifice our HISTORY for them! 🙁
Not only rooms, but most had some sort of dining facilities inside. A pool might be a regular feature too. I’d have hated trying to figure out how to keep the windows clean on this structure. Not to mention keeping those tile roofs from bombarding pedestrians out of the blue.
Friends and I joined the Pasadena Athletic Club about 1974 and were members until the end. The club had lost a bit of it’s luster but was still quite the country club experience for a group of guys in their low twenty’s. We joined for racketball and plyed it on the squash courts with the open spectator galleries above the back wall.
The Indoor Olympic size pool with tiled lanes also had all the standard diving boards and a high dive platform that would pull your trunks off if you didn’t know what you were doing when the aerators were not working. There was a huge communal steam bath that worked well on youthful hangovers, and if that didn’t work, there was a sunning deck with cocktail service on the roof. A cafe on the ground floor served breakfast and lunch.
Before this grand old place closed it’s doors we found colorful flyers in our lockers advertising a new racketball sports club called “California Way”. It was located on the west side of Lake St…maybe Fair Oaks, above Colorado Blvd. I guess it is fitting that I should come across this find today as O. J. passed today and he was an investor along with other well knowns… one hell of a memory on the grand opening evening festivities and post parties… a well spent youth… and a gal I never forgot.
Thanks for sharing your memories with us. I have to ask: did you work up the nerve to approach that gal?