ELAC South Gate Educational Center

Design Team
Diran Depanian (Principal in Charge); Ryan Martell (Project Architect); Design Team: Achin Kundu, Ani Ouzounian, Bertha Olmos, Natalie Hagobian, Jose Torres; IMEG (Structural, Civil, MEP); Troller Mayer (Landscape Architect)

The commission for the design of the ELAC South Gate Educational Center came out of the need for a place of higher education to serve the neighborhoods of southeast Los Angeles. The project site was originally developed by the Firestone Tire & Rubber Company in the 1920s as manufacturing and warehousing facilities. The original buildings were designed in the Italianate Mediterranean Revival Style. The team’s design intent was to bridge the old with the new by emphasizing verticality in the fenestrations and by using key materials such as plaster and brick as a nod to the site’s industrial past.

To enable the building to morph into a technologically forward-thinking 21st-century facility, glass and steel curtain wall towers along with anodized aluminum paneling were incorporated throughout the building.

92000000The program for the project was to basically fit a modern community college campus into the three-story building. This was accomplished through careful study of each department’s programmatic requirements and adjacencies in order to maximize the space allotted.

Additional Information

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