Furniture Firm’s $20M Warehouse Goes Green

PANORAMA CITY, CA-Living Spaces Furniture has a new 188,000-sf warehouse and showroom here in a portion of the former General Motors factory that Oltmans Construction Co. of Whittier, CA converted on behalf of the furniture company in a $20 million project. The new warehouse and showroom for Living Spaces Furniture is now part of “the Plant,” a combination distribution buildings and retail space that has been developed on the site of the former General Motors Assembly Plant.

Oltmans’ Jon Pennock and Don Wade, who served as project manager and senior estimator respectively on the conversion of the property, point out that the new Living Spaces facility replaces the largest metal building at what was formerly General Motors’ largest auto plant. Living Spaces is California’s largest furniture store and is noted for same-day delivery and a variety of other consumer services. The new Panorama City facility is the company’s first in the San Fernando Valley and will employ approximately 300 workers. The company’s other facilities are its headquarters in La Mirada, CA and facilities in Rancho Cucamonga, CA.

In converting the site, Oltmans demolished half of an obsolete 220,000-sf light manufacturing building with 18-foot clearance and created a modern 80,000-sf warehouse featuring 38-foot interior clearance. The general contractor then took the balance of the building and converted it into a contemporary 108,000-sf showroom with 10,000 sf of mezzanine office space.

As part of the project, Oltmans also renovated the entire site with new landscaping, paving, curbs and gutters. The green initiative elements of the project include a modern ground water regeneration system that will take the first three-quarter inches of rainfall and direct it into the ground water system. Other green components include a cool white single-ply roof and an energy-efficient HVAC system. The project was designed by OCIO Designgroup of San Diego.