Architectural plans posted by the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council offer a sneak peak at updated designs for a proposed high-rise development at the intersection of 12th Street and Grand Avenue.

The project, called Arris, is being developed by City Century - the American affiliate of the Chinese real estate firm Shenglong Group.  Plans call for razing a 1930s warehouse and surface parking lot at 1201 S. Grand Avenue, making way for the construction of a new 40-story tower featuring 312 studio, one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments above 359 parking stalls and 7,100 square feet of ground-floor retail space.

MVE + Partners is designing the proposed development, which is depicted in renderings as a glass-and-steel building rising approximately 456 feet in height.  The new housing - which would be accompanied by a rooftop deck, a fitness center, and a swimming pool - would sit atop a five-level parking podium which would be partially masked by residential units.

Renderings included with the presentation also reveal a new design for Vara, a smaller high-rise development which City Century is planning a short distance south at 1233 S. Grand Avenue.  The project, which is currently in plan check, is described as a 21-story structure which would feature 161 apartments above a semi-subterranean parking garage line with ground-floor retail space.

The proposed towers follow on the heels of several similar mixed-use projects on surrounding properties, including Mack Real Estate's 37-story Aven development and twin seven-story apartment complexes built by Wolff Company.

City Century, which acquired the project sites in 2015, has two other large projects in development in the Los Angeles area.  Nexen, now under construction in Koreatown, is a joint venture with Jamison Services featuring 228 apartments and retail space.  Olympia, a proposed three-tower complex near L.A. Live, would include 879 housing units and a 1,000-key hotel.