Kudos for Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects' Skid Row Housing Trust Project

Image by Lawrence Anderson via ArchitectLos Angeles-based architecture firm Lorcan O’Herlihy Architects (LOHA) recently picked up some well-earned accolades when Architect (the magazine of the American Institute of Architects) awarded the Skid Row Housing Trust project the Work Award in its 2012 Annual Design review. The small-in-scale but huge-in-impact project cost $266,500 to renovate the 4,100-square-foot space. The newly improved space includes new management offices, including a library, conference rooms, and a flexible training and event space, which will help the organization better "develop, manage, and operate housing" for the significant homeless population living on the streets east of Downtown Los Angeles. Architect describes LOHA's designs thusly: "Made from off-the-shelf components, the lights consist of white aluminum tubes that brighten and enliven the multipurpose space…The architects also uncovered existing clerestory windows in the building, tapping into an additional natural light source." The LOHA website (kudos on the chemistry motif, by the way) states that the collaboration with the Skid Row Housing trust is ongoing, so we can look forward to more great designs for the social good from LOHA in the future.

This Weekend: Tour the Carver Apartments by Michael Maltzan Architecture

Carver Apartments image via Zev's BlogThis weekend, deLaB (Design East of La Brea) will host a tour of the Carver Apartments by Michael Maltzan Architecture. Since they were completed in 2010, the Carver Apartments--the second Maltzan project for the Skid Row Housing Trust--have been celebrated for innovative design benefitting the large homeless population of Downtown Los Angeles. Tickets for the tour (available here) will cost $20 to tour the 97-unit supportive housing complex, with proceeds benefitting the Skid Row Housing Trust and deLaB.

In a bit of PR-serendipity, deLaB isn’t the only Los Angeles group that has focused  on the community-driven work of Michael Maltzan lately. The blog of LA County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky last week published a long, detailed account of Maltzan’s growing portfolio of work for the Skid Row Housing Trust, the most recent example of which is Star Apartments at 6th Street and Maple Avenue in Downtown LA. Zev’s Blog sums up this latest ambitious effort, which will begin installing units this month, as “a project that will graft pre-fabricated housing units onto an existing, multi-use single-story building at 6th Street and Maple Avenue. A new ‘structural tray’ atop the original building will support the network of 100-plus studio apartments being trucked in from a factory in Idaho, while also forming a kind of outdoor mezzanine with community gardens, jogging track, basketball court, yoga platform and shared kitchen, laundry and computer room spaces.”  So, fans of prefab, keep your calendars open for tours of Maltzan’s latest contribution to the welfare of Los Angeles when that project is complete spring or early summer 2013.

The Star Apartments. Rendering via Zev's Blog.