Construction is nearing completion on Playhouse Plaza, an office and retail complex located on Pasadena's bustling Colorado Boulevard.

The $75 million project, named for the adjacent Pasadena Playhouse, is being developed by Los Angeles-based IDS Real Estate Group.  The five-story edifice at 680 Colorado Boulevard will contain approximately 155,000 square feet of office space on its upper levels.  Plans also call for a series of shops and restaurants on the building's ground floor, served by 367 parking spaces in an underground garage.

Playhouse Plaza was designed in the by Moules & Polyzoides, a Pasadena-based architecture firm well known for its contributions to the new urbanism movement.  The low-rise structure takes inspiration from Bullocks Wilshire, a former luxury department stores which has since been repurposed for use by Southwestern Law School.  Playhouse Plaza mimics the terra cotta and oxidized copper of the 1920s masterpiece with reinforced concrete and green panels of fiber-reinforced plastic.  Architectural renderings displayed on an official project website indicate that the building's interior space features similar Art Deco stylings.

IDS Real Estate Group reportedly expects to complete the project next month.