LA River Park

Living Hybrid tests the relationship between the public and private through a new investigation into a part to whole relationship centered around light and shadows. The relationship works throughout the building creating a slow transition from the private units to the public art galleries and studios. Each unit grows from the window which is the start of the relationship between light and shadow to part and whole. From the window frame, a single unit grows out towards the interior of the building, creating the walls and furniture. The walls twist and fold to create shadows in private areas, as well as incorporate light wells and artificial light areas within their structure. Through the use of interrelationships, new window formations are created allowing for windows which peel off from the facade to allow for a multitude of possible unit types. The windows go through a series of combinations (joining, derivating, morphing, passing, compounding, and absorbing), to merge together into a single formation. As the windows interrelate, the amount of light and the direction of the light changes and combine as well. Starting from the bottom of the building, the units grow allowing for more light to penetrate into the building, reducing the shadows and allowing for larger spaces to be created. The scale of the units also grow from the edge of the building to the corner. When the units arrive at the corner they have morphed and compounded to start passing each other which create the pulled out windows on the east facade. When the units reach the top they have ‘deviated’ and ‘absorbed’ as to fold over the top and create skylights which allow for light penetration throughout the unit with no set shadows.

The main feature of the new LA Park is the water tower. The water tower form is derived from using existing tower profiles. The combined profiles are revolved, extruded, and overlapped to create a full form. The overall form of the tower glitches and switches depending on the view. Moving around the tower, the forms move in and out of the mass and appear more or less as one piece. The first view of the tower when entering the park is the back. From this view the tower looks like one mass that is circular. As you move around the tower counter-clockwise, the parts of the tower start to stand out as individual parts. The front of the tower, is where the parts all come apart and appear as individual sections of the tower. The left side is when the parts still appear separately but start merging back together into the main mass.