A new three-dimensional, vertically oriented digital billboard that may be installed at 8775 Sunset Blvd. by 2019 will feature advertisements and more motion art pieces, according to its team of architects and the West Hollywood City Council.

The billboard, which could be completed by 2019, would sit along the Sunset Strip. (photo courtesy of the city of West Hollywood)

The team presented the pilot proposal for the “West Hollywood Belltower” at a community meeting at the West Hollywood Library Tuesday. Tom Wiscombe Architecture, MOCA and Orange Barrel Media, were the creative team that won the “Sunset Strip Pilot Creative Off-site Advertising Sign” project, a contest two years ago. The proposal had been talked about since it was selected in October 2016 from a group of nine.

The site of the new billboard structure is currently a city-owned parking lot. Upon completion, the billboard would be three-sided with one blank side facing neighborhoods on the strip. The other sides would incorporate layered technology for high-resolution LED video projections of art commissioned by MOCA and static screens for advertisements. Its unique shape will be vertical, rather than the traditional horizontal billboards along the Sunset Strip.

West Hollywood residents will also see a new community plaza on the site of the Belltower, where concerts can be held, and interactive features accessible to anyone walking by.

“West Hollywood is a natural leader for innovation in advertising,” Wiscombe said. “This new architectural form will integrate new digital media and be truly a billboard of the 21st century.”

The city had updated its policy for billboards and wall signs on Sunset Boulevard in 2014, said Bianca Siegl, West Hollywood’s long range and mobility planning manager. The next steps in 2018 will be approving the operational contract, conducting an environmental impact analysis and having the City Council approve the final design.

Siegl said the city had been thinking about the future of digital advertising for years and “wanted the Strip to remain a pioneer of ads.”

“Billboards are part of the mythology of the Sunset Strip, a place known for its signs,” she said. “We wanted to ask ourselves how advertising is changing. So we held the competition to see how someone could use the space creatively.”

Wiscombe said the inspiration for the billboard’s unusual shape came from the adjacent tall trees. He had envisioned the billboard as a “special canvas” for MOCA to also display art. Current digital billboards in West Hollywood, located at 8410 Sunset Blvd. and 9039 Sunset Blvd., have featured art such as animated American flags and a rock ‘n’ roll slideshow by photographer Robert Landau. These horizontal boards devote 13 minutes per hour to exhibits. That art is curated by Jessica Rich as part of the Innovation Foundation.

Rebecca Ehemann, the city’s public art coordinator, said that the new billboard will also have more art in blocks. The current ones feature art at the top of the hour and the bottom of the hour. The new billboard would have 15 minutes per hour instead, and feature bigger blocks of art time, she said.

“The most important part was displaying this art and it’s a really important part of the project,” Wiscombe said. “One of MOCA’s main initiatives was taking art out of the gallery and into the public sphere.”

The art exhibits would vary, shown either one time per week, one time per month, or for special events, according to MOCA. An important aspect was also being a venue for multimedia artists to exercise creative freedom with digital media technology, Wiscombe said.

Local residents had mixed reactions to the billboard. Jonni Wood, a resident of Shoreham Pines, a West Hollywood Heights neighborhood, said she was concerned about how the structure would change the culture of the area. Her primary concerns were the light the billboard would project would lead to overlighting in her home. Additionally, she was unhappy about her current view of the city being partially obstructed.

“The design is beautiful,” Wood said at the meeting. “But the billboard is just in the wrong place.”

“We’re used to the bustle of the city,” she added. “So it’s not like we’re not used to living like this. But even farmer’s markets a few years ago caused a lot of noise. If there will be special events like concerts there, I can’t imagine how the noise would sound for people living smack in the middle of it. The city needs to think about if this will be consistent with sound ordinances.”

Elyse Eisenberg, president of the West Hollywood Heights Neighborhood Association, expressed similar concerns.

“When we first heard about the project, there was nothing to indicate it was that massive,” she said. “It’s just very overscaled compared to the rest of the area.”

Wood also said that the residents in her complex would lose valuable parking spots; Eisenberg agreed. She was concerned that the busy intersection could also see even more accidents based on the placement of the billboard, where people might turn their heads to glance at it and be distracted from the road.

Additionally, the city hadn’t accounted for replacing public parking if the lot were to go out of use, Wood said.

“Parking on the Strip is needed, and even giving up the five spots in that parking lot is too many,” she said. “That’s the only parking for about a mile on the Strip. Public parking is something everyone’s been screaming about for years. There is no net loss that is acceptable.”

“We don’t want to live in Las Vegas,” Wood said. “We want to live in WeHo.”

Business owner Christopher Shane, who owns property on 8752 Sunset Blvd. where Eveleigh Restaurant is, said he felt the digital sign was “blight.”

“The romantic atmosphere of fine dining declines when you have huge TV screens blasting at you through the windows,” he said, adding that the billboard would be directly in front of the restaurant and undeniably visible to diners. “If nobody says anything, economic interest will always win out.”

“Just because the city makes more revenue with billboards than parking does not mean it’s for the better public benefit,” Eisenberg said.

West Hollywood Heights resident Nathan Schram was less worried.

“I’ve lived on the Strip for six years,” he said. “I think the space this billboard will be occupying will create engagement in the heart of the Strip. It will be an evolution from the horizontal ads you see normally. It’s also a fresh way to show art that isn’t stereotypical.”