Commission to Hear About Renovations to 90-Year-Old Buildings, Construction of Major New Facilities at Las Encinas Hospital

Tuesday, the City of Pasadena’s Historic Preservation Commission will review a proposal submitted by the owners of Aurora Las Encinas Hospital, a private psychiatric hospital in Pasadena, to construct a one-to-three-story independent-living building and a two-story assisted living/memory care building on its campus at 2900 E. Del Mar Blvd.

The project also proposes the relocation and rehabilitation of two historic buildings in the complex – the Las Palmas and The Lodge – which are within the boundaries of the Southern California Sanitarium Historic District and therefore needs to be reviewed by the Historic Preservation Commission.

Before the regular meeting at 6 p.m., members of the Commission are set to visit the hospital site at about 4:45 p.m.

David Reyes, the City’s Director of Planning and Community Development, will present a staff report detailing findings of studies about the impact of the new construction and the relocation of the historic buildings in the hospital’s campus.

An Agenda Report from Reyes showed it will be recommending that the Historic Preservation Commission forward a number of recommendations about the Las Palmas and The Lodge buildings to the City’s Design Commission.

In summary, the recommendations that need to be forwarded to the Design Commission have to do with the project proponents providing additional documentation about the condition of the exterior cedar shingles at The Lodge, dimensioned drawings of the existing buildings including details of important architectural features, and a window and door inventory indicating the condition of each window and door and how the proponents plan to dispose of them.

Reyes’ report said the Las Palmas building was originally built around 1926 as a residential duplex, later expanded to a triplex before World War II. A second addition was constructed after the war.

The Lodge was constructed between 1905 and 1910 in the Craftsman style as a duplex. The building has a cross-gabled roof with a combination of composition shingles and asphalt rolled roofing, cedar shake exterior wall cladding and groupings of wood windows and French doors.

According to the project design, the buildings will be moved to a location about 250 feet from their present position and are proposed to be used as independent living units. The report did not include detail on how the proponents will be moving the two historic buildings.

Meanwhile, the new independent living building and the new assisted living building which are part of the project are proposed to have a combined size of 196,401 square feet.

Reyes said staff have conducted thorough analysis of the elements of the project, and that the proponent need to submit the recommended documentation, drawings and inventory to ensure the project will be consistent with Standards of Rehabilitation set by the U.S. Secretary of the Interior.

The standards cover all types of construction or renovation being done on structures contained within areas listed under the National Registry of Historic Places, including the Southern California Sanitarium Historical District.

The Historic Preservation Commission meets Tuesday at 6 p.m. at the George Ellery Hale Building Hearing Room at City Hall, after the site visit to Las Encinas Hospital.