Santa Monica Blvd, Los Angeles, in progress 2019

images: IwamotoScott

IwamotoScott are currently in the construction documents phase for this 16 unit housing project in Los Angeles. The project introduces a slightly increased level of scale and density to this portion of Santa Monica Blvd in East Hollywood. The design reconsiders two established housing typologies common to LA - the prized, typically somewhat older 'courtyard housing' examples, and the frequently less-noble yet highly efficient so-called 'dingbat apartments' of the 60s and 70s. Here both precedents are transformed so as to balance greater unit density demanded by the state/city-wide housing shortage, with a desire to take advantage of LA's indoor-outdoor living. The design is highly informed by its immediate as well as its expanded context. Its simple, subtly stepped and abstractly modulated facade responds to the both the richer facade patterns and relief found in the adjacent historic branch library next door (the city's second oldest public library), and to the humble everyday stucco faced commercial and residential buildings that line the boulevards and alleys of LA.