Celadon
Celadon has sat entitled at Garfield and Garvey in downtown Monterey Park since 2021, unbuilt. The city council just approved a substantially different version: 169 rental apartments in place of 109 for-sale condos, and far less retail.
Units
169
Affordable units
Not stated in any source found; Monterey Park's 15% rental inclusionary ordinance presumptively applies but compliance is unconfirmed
Details
- Address
- 114 E Garvey Avenue, Monterey Park, CA 91755
- Case number
- DA-26-01 (amendment); Vesting Tentative Map 26-05 (County Map No. 82800)
- Lot size
- ~95,428 sq ft (~2.19 acres) across six parcels
- Stories
- 7
- Unit mix
- 1- and 2-bedroom
- Commercial
- ~16,300 sq ft retail/commercial
- Parking
- 343 spaces
- Amenities
- New public plaza
- Prior approval
- City Council, 2021-10-06: 109 condominiums, 71,366 sq ft commercial, 16 to 69 du/acre
- CEQA
- Statutory exemption, Public Resources Code §21080.66 (AB 130)
Condos flip to apartments, five years later
Celadon has been entitled at the corner of Garfield and Garvey in downtown Monterey Park since 2021, and never built. The city council just approved a substantially different version of it: 169 rental apartments in place of 109 for-sale condos, and far less retail.
What's proposed
Seven stories, 169 rental apartments — one- and two-bedroom — over roughly 16,300 square feet of commercial space, plus a new public plaza, on the same 95,428-square-foot, six-parcel site as the 2021 approval. The switch from condominiums to rentals is as significant as the unit-count change: the 2021 scheme was for-sale housing over ground-floor retail; the approved redesign is a rental building, full stop, with commercial confined to the ground floor and a plaza replacing much of the retail frontage. The affordable set-aside for the redesign hasn't surfaced in any source reviewed — the 2021 approval's affordability terms, if any, don't necessarily carry over to a different housing type.
The design
Studio T-SQUARE designed the approved redesign. Jerde, which drew the original 2021 scheme — a mixed-use building with terraced dining and layered landscape — is no longer attached to the project; its design work now describes a building that will not be built.
Why the project flipped from mostly retail to mostly rental isn't stated in any source reviewed — the city's own hearing notice and press coverage of the August 5 approval describe what changed, not why. Second reading and final adoption of the DA amendment ordinance also hasn't been confirmed.
Why this one matters
Monterey Park approved a project in 2021 that was, by floor area, mostly commercial. Five years later, on the same six parcels, the same corner comes back and gets approved as mostly rental housing. Entitled is still not built — Celadon has now been approved twice without a shovel in the ground. Two other large Monterey Park projects sit nearby in this pipeline: 601 Potrero Grande Drive and 2100 Saturn Street, 159 homes on a former office campus, approved the same summer.
What this means if you live nearby
The corner doesn't change until permits issue, and the site has now sat entitled without construction for five years running. If this redesign moves forward, the shift is roughly 55,000 fewer square feet of retail and restaurant space downtown, a new public plaza, and 169 rental apartments rather than for-sale condos.
Team
Source (staff-report): https://www.montereypark.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/19323/PHN---Celadon---City-Council---8-5-26 · retrieved 2026-08-14 · last verified 2026-09-01