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Apr 01, 2023

Content of former TRW HQ in Lyndhurst set for auction

The huge I-beam sculpture on the grounds of the former TRW Inc. corporate

The huge I-beam sculpture on the grounds of the former TRW Inc. corporate headquarters in Lyndhurst, as well as all the building's remaining contents, will be auctioned online on BidSpotter.com beginning Tuesday, May 23.

There are hundreds of items that will be up for auction, said John Greene, owner of industrial equipment sales firm FL Sales of Solon, in a phone interview. FL is holding the sale with Lee Stevens Machinery Inc. of Wixom, Michigan, which provides the auctioneer.

Greene said the two are barred from using specific names for the complex and its owner, so the auction is being marketed as the "former world headquarters of a Fortune 500 company."

The items are at 1950 Richmond Road in Lyndhurst, an address well-known in the Northeast Ohio business community.

The Cleveland Clinic, which received the corporate campus as a donation when Northrop Grumman bought TRW in 2006, in March announced it had closed its operation there as part of consolidating office locations. The building will be demolished, as there were no takers for it following a four-year marketing effort with the CBRE brokerage.

An onsite inspection will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Monday, May 22, but bidders will have to go to their computers to bid, as the auction is entirely online. Registered bidders may submit offers online as soon as the catalog is fully posted. The sale will begin closing at 10 a.m. on May 23 and will conclude after 10 a.m. on Wednesday, May 24, according to the brochure.

"The owner has removed what they want," Greene said. "There is 500,000 square feet of items for sale. There are offices full of furniture, 300 auditorium chairs and the iconic I-beam statue."

More mundane, but prized in such offerings, are switchgears, air compressors and artwork.

Greene said his background is primarily in selling equipment from empty industrial plants, but a contact he declined to identify asked him if an auction for the fixtures was feasible.

"It makes sense," Greene said. "One, it generates cash. Two, everything we sell is one less item that goes to the landfill."

But removing the items is the successful bidder's problem.

The I-beam auction weighs an estimated 10 tons, according to Dirk Lohan, a Chicago architect who created the statue. His former firm, FCL Associates (Lohan is the "L" in "FCL") also designed the demolition-destined building, which has sections of five and six stories in height. He's now the principal of Lohan Architecture.

Lohan said he doesn't plan to bid on his artwork, as he lives on the lakefront in Chicago and doesn't have room.

The sculpture has a surprising, in terms of its simplicity, back story.

"We had extra I-beams left after construction," Lohan said. He said TRW "told us to do what we could with them. So, we made a sculpture out of them."

Lohan did not know the property was bound for the wrecking ball before getting the call about the auction of the sculpture.

"My God," Lohan said. "It's one of my best buildings. Tremendous dollars went into it. The glass and the quality of the building are significant."

A favorite part of the design, he added, is that its underground parking garage eliminated most surface parking. That allowed people inside the structure to enjoy the site's natural surroundings.

The Clinic said in March that removing the structure would make the nearly 100-acre campus more marketable.

Lyndhurst Mayor Patrick Ward said in an email that the Clinic has been taking steps to plan for the demolition of the building but as of Wednesday, May 10, had not filed to do so.