Sunset Strip could get a whimsical 19-story hotel tower

The Sunset Strip could get yet another hotel, this time in the form of a bold 19-story tower. The Charles Company has filed plans with the city of West Hollywood to build a 185-room hotel near the southeast corner of Doheny and Sunset Boulevard, reports WeHoville.

Designed by R & A Architecture and Design, the circular tower is visually reminiscent of Robert Therrien's sculpture of stacked plates in the lobby at The Broad.

In addition to hotel rooms, the project would include 14 apartments, a 915-square-foot art gallery, 7,500 square feet of restaurant space, and room for events and retail.

Documents for the proposed hotel at 9034 Sunset refer to the project as the Sunset Tower, but that's not likely its actual intended name, given that there is already a fairly famous Sunset Tower Hotel about a mile east the proposed hotel on Sunset Boulevard.

As WeHoville notes, this proposed development is likely to reignite the argument that West Hollywood is on its way to having too many hotel rooms.

The proposed hotel is next to the under-construction West Hollywood Edition Hotel and Residences, which will hold 190 rooms and 20 condos. When the Edition and the Kimpton hotel open, the number of hotel rooms in the city will soar 28 percent to 2,641, says WeHoville, and that's not counting projects like this one that have been proposed but not yet approved.

The Strip is steadily reinventing itself as a hip, high-end destination, adding new developments wherever and whenever possible, often doing away with reminders of the Strip's grittier, rock 'n' roller past and replacing them with exclusive clubs, chic hotels, and fancy apartments. (Case in point: the old Hustler store will be replaced by an outpost of a Gwyneth Paltrow-approved, no-swearing-allowed, members-only club.)

• The Sunset Tower? Another One Is Planned for Sunset Boulevard [WeHoville]