Downtown Jewelry Exchange/Warner Bros. Theatre | Los Angeles Conservancy
Photo by Annie Laskey/L.A. Conservancy

Downtown Jewelry Exchange/Warner Bros. Theatre

The 1920 Pantages Theatre, a nine-story steel-framed building designed by architect B. Marcus Priteca, was the city’s second theatre (and the country’s sixteenth) built for the namesake vaudeville circuit. It is a richly ornamented Beaux Arts structure that includes a 2,200 seat theatre, shops, and offices on the upper floors.  

In 1929, the theatre became the Warner Bros. Downtown Theatre and eventually Warren's Theatre. When the theatre finally closed in 1975, it was used as a church and then converted into retail space as the Downtown Jewelry Exchange in the late 1980s.

Vestiges of its Warner Bros. legacy remain.  The familiar Warner Bros. emblem is visible behind the current diamond motif above the buildings’ corner marquee. The parapet continues to read “Warner Bros. Downtown Bldg.”

Despite the building’s new use, much of the interior of the theatre’s baroque ornamentation remains. The elaborate coved auditorium ceiling features a sunburst mural surrounded by Egyptian, Oriental, Greek, and Roman figures. The figures are still intact, although a modern chandelier obscures the sunburst. Flanking the stage are the original Corinthian columns.

Photo by Annie Laskey/L.A. Conservancy

Continental Building

Known as the first skyscraper in downtown L.A., the lavishly decorated 1904 Beaux-Arts style tower remained the city's tallest office building until the late 1950s.
Exterior of The Trust Building. Photo by Adrian Scott Fine/L.A. Conservancy

The Trust Building

When the Title Insurance and Trust Building opened it was called the “Queen of Spring Street” due to its great size. In 2020 it reopens as The Trust Building following a full rehabilitation.
Metro 417
Photo by Floyd Bariscale

Metro 417

Designed in the Beaux Arts style with Italian Renaissance ornamentation, this 1926 building has dual entrances, one to the offices above, and one to a concourse that served the city's early subway.