An enormous warehouse that after produced airplanes for McDonnell Douglas and Boeing is now full of one other basic automobile: Mercedes.
The German automaker’s Mercedes-Benz Basic middle on North Lakewood Blvd. in Lengthy Seashore was constructed to “wow” house owners and fans alike.
Housed in a part of the 1 million-square-foot warehouse, the 61,500-square-foot facility consists of 41,500 sq. ft of workspace and one other 20,000 sq. ft for automobile storage, auto restoration and upkeep. A showroom shows basic vehicles from the Nineteen Fifties and Nineteen Sixties.
The operation, which opened in March 2022, moved final yr from its earlier 27,600-square-foot location in Irvine. The Southern California facility is one in every of solely two Mercedes-Benz Basic facilities on the earth. The opposite is in Germany.
“We opened the Irvine facility in 2006, however simply outgrew it,” stated Mike Kunz, who manages the Lengthy Seashore middle.
Staffed by 22 workers, the brand new middle has seen a gradual demand for automobile restoration amongst house owners of basic Mercedes-Benz autos, he stated. The middle’s storage space homes about 40 autos, whereas among the classic vehicles within the showroom are on the market.
“Some are privately owned and others are owned by our company,” he stated.
The rest of the 1 million-square-foot constructing is used as a holding space for Mercedes-Benz autos that arrive on the ports of Los Angeles and Lengthy Seashore earlier than being shipped to space dealerships.
The middle is open to the general public seven days per week.
Hendy, an inside structure and design agency primarily based in Newport Seashore, created the Mercedes-Benz Basic Middle, working with Mercedes over 5 months to craft an area that’s occasion historical past, half sensible.
“It’s actually a constructing inside a constructing,” stated Carolina Weidler, undertaking lead and Hendy’s co-chief government. “Designing the U.S.-based house for the heritage arm of a worldwide luxurious automotive firm is a large accountability.”
The constructing’s stylish industrial design, she stated, required meticulous consideration to element.
The workspace consists of fashionable service bays outfitted with the most recent know-how and hydraulic lifts, in addition to a store space outfitted to revive and repair basic Mercedes-Benz autos, starting from the Nineteen Fifties to fashions from the Nineteen Seventies and Nineteen Eighties.
The middle additionally consists of areas the place upholsterers can sew leather-based seats, painters can color-match historic hues and metallic staff can style components that now not exist — even for a basic Nineteen Fifties mannequin 300 SL.
“These folks take these vehicles aside piece by piece, bolt by bolt and clear and repair them,” Weidler stated. “There may be a variety of consideration to element, and we needed to take that into consideration. And the storage space needed to be versatile. They could solely get 5 vehicles one month — however the subsequent month it is perhaps triple that.”
The middle’s showroom options floor-to-ceiling home windows that flood the house with pure gentle and are punctuated by LED lighting fixtures to higher showcase the autos.
“The architects and designers at Hendy embraced the planning and execution wanted to replicate our model’s signature appear and feel, whereas additionally designing a extremely technical and extremely purposeful setting that’s half restore middle, half Corridor of Fame,” Kunz stated. “It instantly immerses folks right into a signature Mercedes-Benz model expertise.”
