Studio LaM

Studio Work (2014 Spring Semester, Michael Maltzan Studio, GSD)

Location : Los Angeles, California, USA

Program: Mixed-Use

Design Period : February, 2013 ~ May, 2013

Design Team: Kangil Ji, Tianci Han, Karol Malik

Organizer: –

Interpretation of Context

Proposal

Little Los Angeles: City as Architecture

Narrative

As Los Angeles confronts the need to densification, this project propose a strategy to do so in a fashion that preserves and amplifies the experience of the city today, and makes good on its longstanding promise of a lifestyle of convenience and rich experience.
Fundamental to phenomenological interpretation of the city is the idea that it is built by an urbanism of desire, connecting programs through continuous surface and the impression of horizontal movement. We observe that Los Angeles is topographically complex, but feels “flat” from the perspective of the user because it is constructed on a continuous paved surface, with little to no threshold between parking and the contents of its structures. This project also observe that the city strives towards the synoptic view: the hillside house that frames the panoramic urban spread below.