TRD: Kurt Rappaport moves his shop to new HQ in Beverly Hills
Westside Estate Agency will relocate to Art Deco building owned by the luxury residential broker
Westside Estate Agency, one of L.A.’s most exclusive boutique real estate brokerages, is moving to a new location in a building owned by co-founder Kurt Rappaport.
At the end of the first quarter 2023, WEA will move to 460 North Canon Drive in Beverly Hills. It’s an Art Deco-style building constructed in 1936 with about 3,600 square feet. The location offers a two-block walk to shops along Rodeo Drive.
WEA’s new digs stand across the street from the Wallis Annenberg Center for The Performing Arts and a couple of blocks away from the site of Cheval Blanc, the upcoming hotel under development by luxury goods conglomerate LVMH on the corner of Rodeo Drive and South Santa Monica Boulevard.
WEA co-founder Stephen Shapiro said the new location would serve as a billboard.
“The visibility and accessibility are important aspects to being there,’” he told TRD.
Rappaport said the building’s atrium would focus on a live, 20-foot tall oak tree surrounded by a circular bench. The building’s design features include polished concrete floors and Japanese-inspired maple wood desks.
“We want you to feel like you’re in a great house, not in an office,” Rappaport said.
With the relocation, WEA will leave its 6,000-square-foot headquarters on a quieter stretch of North Canon Drive in Beverly Hills where it has worked for 20 years. Shapiro said that the office is too big for a company with agents always on the go.
Rappaport is often credited as the Los Angeles market’s biggest broker for luxury homes, but many of his deals are off market. Clients include Oracle’s billionaire founder Larry Ellison and music superstar Dr. Dre.
WEA’s new office is part of a 23,000-square-foot row of offices running from 448 to 460 North Canon Drive, which Rappaport purchased for $40 million in 2018. He said that his new office will include space for a chef-driven restaurant as well as an art museum. The public will be able to view art, but not purchase art at the space.
Rappaport worked with architect Dan Brunn for four years to refurbish the compound to its Art Deco origins. In the 1970s, former Paramount Studios chief Robert Evans worked in the offices and held screenings. In the following decades, it was a headquarters for real estate firm Fred Sands.
