FIDM to Expand Downtown Campus

Administrators at the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising’s downtown Los Angeles campus signed a 10-year lease for $2.3 million as part of a move to expand classroom facilities.

FIDM will take about 6,000 square feet of space on the ground floor of the Renaissance Tower Apartments on Olympic Boulevard, across from its main campus, according to brokers at Charles Dunn Real Estate, which represented landlord Western Multifamily LLC in the transaction.

“It’s not only an ideal geographic location for FIDM as well as the other retail tenants who are opening at the property but also provides FIDM with needed space for the expansion of its classroom facilities,” said Lee Shapiro of Charles Dunn’s West Los Angeles office.

FIDM already has a teaching facility next to the Renaissance. In addition to FIDM, a Maui Wowie coffee and smoothie shop will open in the same facility, Shapiro said.

The school is also planning to add more student housing and classroom space near Flower and Olympic. The “FIDM Tower” will be a high-rise with more than 240,000 square feet of interior space. —Robert McAllister