Tonight> Watch Leo Villareal’s “Bay Lights” in San Francisco (or Online!)
Rendering of the Bay Lights installation. (Courtesy Bay Lights)
Lighting artist Leo Villareal has been busy lately, opening installations in the New York City subway system and in Madison Square Park, but an even bigger achievement is set to debut tonight in San Francisco. Villareal has attached 25,000 LED lights to the San Francisco Bay Bridge and connected them to a computer in order to create dazzling lighting displays viewable from the city and the water along the suspension bridge.
Called The Bay Lights, the project celebrates the bridge’s 75th anniversary and is set to go live tonight at 8:30 PST. But don’t worry, if you’re not in San Francisco to view the installation from the Embarcadero or Telegraph Hill, the event will be streamed live online at the project’s website here. Until then, check out a couple videos below of the installation being tested. The Bay Lights is believed to be the largest of its type in the world and will be in San Francisco for two years, lit each night from dusk till 2:00a.m.
Redondo Waterfront May Get Major Redesign
Developer’s proposed boutique hotel. (Courtesy CenterCal)
El Segundo, CA-based developer CenterCal recently revealed plans for a revamped Redondo Beach waterfront near Los Angeles, which includes parts of the Redondo Beach Pier, as well as the nearby boardwalk and Seaside Lagoon. According to The Daily Breeze, CenterCal presented its plans to residents, local business owners, and community groups at a meeting on February 23.
AEG Funding Pledge Makes Redesign Of LA’s Pershing Square More Likely
Pershing Square as it looks now. (David A Galvan / Flickr)
Once considered downtown LA’s central park, the problematic 4.5-acre Pershing Square may soon be slated for a few welcome changes. Councilman José Huizar of District 14 recently told LA Downtown News that sports and entertainment company Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) has committed $700,000 seed funding to re-think the 164-year-old park. The money is part of a community improvement package AEG had agreed to in order to create a football stadium in Los Angeles.
Frank Gehry Unveils Mixed-Use Tower For Santa Monica
Frank Gehry’s 22-story tower for Santa Monica. (Courtesy Gehry Partners)
OMA and Robert A.M. Stern are not the only starchitects zeroing in on Santa Monica. Frank Gehry is designing a 22-story, 244-foot-tall tower on a 1.9 acre site on the corner of Ocean Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard. Plans for the project were submitted to the city yesterday, according to the Santa Monica Planning Department. The tower, located just a block from the beach and around the corner from the 3rd Street Promenade, would house a 125-room hotel, 22 condos, and two stories of retail and restaurants. A 36,000-square-foot art museum, incorporating two landmarked structures, would also be built just north of the tower.
Bahooka is Bust: Los Angeles’ Kitsch Tiki Treasure To Close
A fish swims above Bahooka’s bar. (Sam Lubell/ AN )
Alas. One of LA’s greatest weird treasures, the Bahooka Family Restaurant, is set to close on March 10. The gem, which opened its Rosemead location in 1976, is perhaps the most ornate example of Tiki architecture in the city. Not only is it full of every Polynesian tchotchke imaginable—Easter Island heads, hula dancers, blowfish, diving bells—but most of its walls are covered with fish tanks, creating the feeling of being inside Sponge Bob’s home. The restaurant’s owners have said they’re simply ready to retire, which we certainly understand, but we must admit we’re a little sad.
Google Keeping Up With the Silicon Valley Joneses, Unveils New Campus Design by NBBJ
Rendering of Google’s planned Bay View campus, by NBBJ. (Courtesy NBBJ)
Last week we reported on Gensler’s planned triangular Nvidia headquarters in Santa Clara, the latest addition to the architectural arms race that is Silicon Valley. (We’re seeing zoomy new headquarters for Apple, Samsung, HP, Nvidia, etc, etc.) Now there’s yet another. Google’s new project adjacent to its “Googleplex” in Mountain View, has unveiled their new designs by NBBJ. The new campus, which is being called Bay View, is comprised of nine crimped, predominantly-four-story buildings. Each building will be connected by a bridge; a connectivity that has become a staple of NBBJ’s office work around the world, including its new headquarters for Samsung nearby. The competition to out-campus the competition seems to be heating up. Who’s next?
Gossip: Los Angeles’ Grand Avenue Edition
Arquitectonica’s new Grand Avenue tower just broke ground. (Courtesy Related Companies)
The Grand, the multi-million-dollar, mixed use project on top of LA’s Bunker Hill, is finally… slowly… moving forward with an Arquitectonica-designed residential tower, which just broke ground. But it appears that Frank Gehry’s days on the project may be numbered. After a recent call with Related, we got no assurances that the starchitect was still part of the project. A report in the Downtown News got similarly uncommitted answers.
Just across the street from the Grand we hear that The Broad (what’s with all the THEs?)—Eli Broad’s multi-million-dollar art museum—is getting ready to add an upscale market to its rear, just above the parking lot. If it’s even close to as successful as Chelsea Market in New York, Downtown LA could have yet another hit on its hands. Meanwhile, decking is being laid for a new park to The Broad’s south, but still no renderings of the park have been unveiled. Let’s make this public, Mr. Broad. We can’t wait to see your plans, which could single-handedly make or break Grand Avenue.
Gensler Triangulates a New Santa Clara Headquarters for Nvidia
Rendering of Nvidia planned Silicon Valley headquarters in Santa Clara. (Courtesy Gensler)
Silicon Valley definitely has the architecture bug. We’ve recently seen remarkable new designs put forth by Foster + Partners for Apple and NBBJ for Samsung. Now Gensler has released ambitious new designs for tech company Nvidia, located in Santa Clara. The 24-acre complex’s two 500,000-square-foot buildings are each shaped like triangles, a configuration that Gensler principal Hao Ko explains facilitates collaboration by allowing connections to each side of the building to be the shortest. (The triangle, he adds, is also “the fundamental primitive that defines all shapes in the digital realm.”) Undulating roofs will be made up of smaller triangle pieces, breaking down the overall mass and allowing for ample skylighting, in the in-between spaces. Construction is set to begin this summer, with completion in 2015. Apple’s circle now has geometric competition. Who’s next?
AN Visits Joshua Tree to Celebrate the Upcoming “Never Built:Los Angeles” Exhibition
Karl Daubmann, Greg Goldin, and Sam Lubell (Chris Miller)
This past weekend AN West Coast Editor Sam Lubell joined the A+D Museum in Joshua Tree to discuss the upcoming exhibition, Never Built: Los Angeles. The A+D Museum hosted the party at the Blu Homes-designed home of Tim Disney in Joshua Tree. The gorgeous prefab is sited in the middle of a what looks like a Martian landscape, with weird trees and amazing rock formations. Partiers were treated to a preview of the show from the curators, moderated by Blu Homes’ creative director Karl Daubmann. If you want to find out more about the show, watch the curators appear on Southern California station KCET’s SoCal Connected this evening at 5:30 and 10:30 PST.
On View> Dara Friedman’s New Film Dances Through City Streets, Now Showing in Los Angeles
(Courtesy Hammer Museum)
Hammer Projects: Dara Friedman
Hammer Museum
10899 Wilshire Blvd.
Los Angeles
Through April 14
Miami-based artist Dara Friedman is known for her black and white films of dancers dancing through city streets. For her film Dancer (2011) she used a 16mm camera to examine urban space and individuals within these spaces, filming improvisational dancers in a variety of styles, from flamenco, to ballet, to belly and break dancing, and more. In her work, Friedman also investigates accepted concepts of performance-based art. Her grainy films sometimes capture the sounds of street traffic, and she sometimes dubs music that is not always in rhythm with the dancers’ movements. For her first exhibition in Los Angeles, Friedman has prepared an 8mm film that is a follow-up to Dancer.
Modernism Week: Sneak Inside Palm Springs’ Future Architecture and Design Center
Exterior of E. Stewart Williams’ Santa Fe Savings and Loan, future home of the Palm Springs Architecture and Design Center (Julius Shulman)
Another weekend, another Modernism Week. One of our favorites: a look inside the Palm Springs Art Museum’s future Architecture and Design Center, located inside E. Stewart Williams’ sleek Santa Fe Federal Savings & Loan (1960). The International Style building is being renovated by Marmol Radziner, who also worked on Richard Neutra’s nearby Kaufmann House. The museum has already raised more than $4 million to buy and renovate the building, and is now just $1 million shy of what’s needed to get work underway. The organizers hope to break ground in the next few months and open the center by fall 2014. But for now, its interior is still lots of quirky fun, including a chance to walk inside the old bank vaults, check out the old drive through teller, and explore the old kitchens and mechanical systems.
Slideshow> 2013 Los Angeles CANstruction Winners
“The LAX EnCANter Restaurant” by RBB Architects. (Tom Bonner)
Every year architects across the country take their talents to CANstruction, creating fascinating structures out of tin cans. CanstructionLA recently announced this year’s winners, and there are some impressive results to share. Participants created local icons like the LAX Theme Building (RBB Architects), the California state flag (Clark Construction and Thornton Tomasetti), and the Port of LA (RBB Architects). The jury’s favorite, Filling a (Growing) Need, by NBBJ and Buro Happold, was made up of an undulating landscape of canned kidney beans, potatoes, beets, and mixed vegetables. The event contributed 21,076 pounds of food and $12,034 to the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank.
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