AIAPF
Logo  
Return to Current Gallery
2017 Awards
Design Awards: All Entries
Design Awards: Google Map
Residential
Institutional / Educational
Commercial/Industrial/Recreational
Small Project Any Type
Urban Design / Planning
Renovation
Interior Architecture
Unbuilt
Various & Sundry
Students
Archives
2021
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
Unbuilt
Return to List
****   Citation   ****
Art Center College of Design, Mullin Gallery
(# 706)
Category:
Images Description Credits
project dates:
September 2016 – Present (CD phase)- Target Completion June 2018

project size:
6,300 square foot renovation on the ground floor of an existing 128,000 s.f. high rise.

In 2014 a prominent college purchased the 1111 South Arroyo Parkway building; a 1980’s mirrored, lozenge shaped, 128,000 square foot, six story high rise at the very end of the historic 110 freeway in Pasadena. By its position in the city, its location at the southern end of the future campus and its sheer scale it will eventually become the gateway to college's south campus. Even now it functions as a kind of marker into the city of Pasadena. The building represents a great urban opportunity for the school. This is particularly true for the ground floor and the way it relates to the public realm. When we were asked to create a small gallery named for a prominent donor on the ground floor of the building we naturally analyzed it in the context of city. Through that study, we realized the project needed to be turned inside out to function as a gallery,  a signifier for the school and a cultural destination in this part of the city.

The modest 6,300 square foot space is programmed to function as an automotive gallery (in keeping with the donor’s passions and prolific car collection) and a fine art gallery. The automobile itself became both an object of art and instrument for viewing art in the development of the project.

As the diagram developed we began to ruminate on two fundamental works of twentieth century architecture. The Villa Savoye became a simple point of contact as we worked the cars through the diagram and began concretizing the arcing forms dictated by the turn of the wheel. The spatial envelope, literally captured by the high rise above and the parking structure below, is bounded vertically. In this way we began to think about slipping in and out of the envelope horizontally conjuring Mies Van Der Rohe and the German pavilion in Barcelona.

As the walls slipped through to the exterior in the design process we began exploring variations in transparency. The car as an instrument for viewing presented the opportunity for opacity and signage on the oblique from afar and views straight in on the perpendicular while passing by. The ‘fin wall’ is the current rendition of a series of design studies exploring the idea depicted in the animation stills above.

Image









 Log in to your
Submittal Work Area
Please use the contact form, if
you encounter any problem
User Name
Password
Forgot your password