Citing changing market conditions and engineering challenges, prolific Koreatown developer Jamison Services, Inc. is changing up its plans for a dual-tower project across the street from the Wilshire/Normandie subway station.

Under plans approved by the City of Los Angeles in 2017, Jamison intended to raze existing parking and commercial buildings along the east side of Ardmore Avenue between 6th Street and Wilshire Boulevard to make way for a pair of apartment towers - rising to heights of 32 and 14 stories - containing 428 apartments and approximately 32,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space.  Plans also called for a central parking garage with accommodations for more than 860 vehicles.

A revised application, filed with the Department of City Planning on September 21, calls for cutting the height of the larger south tower to 23 stories (280 feet).  However, the amount of apartments proposed would remain unchanged, as the height decreased would be offset by shifting the building's mass north, giving it an L-shaped footprint.

Both iterations of the project are designed by Los Angeles-based architecture firm Gruen Associates.

The impetus for the design change, according to an attachment to the project application, is a mix of market conditions and engineering difficulties.  A feasibility study conducted in July for Jamison Services indicates that the revised plan would reduce the development's cost by approximately 20 percent, reducing the anticipated construction timeline and additional infrastructure required for a taller building.

Additionally, shifting the tower's mass north would allow Jamison to avoid additional structural work to protect the adjacent subway tunnel - which is located just 30 feet south of the project site.

While Jamison has gone back to the drawing board for the tower complex at 3545 Wilshire, construction is already in full swing at several of its other Koreatown developments.

One mile east, a 25-story tower that is being developed by Jamison and Hankey Group has topped out at 2900 Wilshire Boulevard.

Directly across Wilshire from the Ardmore property, Jamison is in the process of converting a 1950s office building into multifamily housing.