Site: South Los Angeles, California

This project derives from a spring topic studio at USC that asks students to take responsibility for the community in which we live, and to design a facility that addresses the fundamental responsibilities and values of architecture while demonstrating the ability to develop the tectonic content of the project and test the performance of the proposals made.

After a careful consideration of city objectives, firefighter’s perspectives and neighborhood concerns, the design of Firestation no. 15 would aim to actively engage with the community.  The most public corner of the building (30th St. and Vermont Ave.)  is designed to welcome the community for meetings and city related issues.  The building is carved from its rectangle mass, an “L” shaped translucent circulation bar that would allow light into the entire building.  Taking into the consideration that most fire stations do not allow transparent glass due to the privacy of public figure buildings, I incorporated a facade that would serve two functions for the fire station; privacy and sustainability concerns.  The façade would act as a shading device for the eastern part of the building, as well as create privacy between pedestrians and workers on the public corridor.  The fire station also consist of staggering floors at 5’ apart in height, this strategy aims to solve the problem of height in different bays as well as enhances the visual connection between fire fighters.  These design strategies aim to achieve a comfortable, energy efficient, socially interactive work environment for the fire fighters and most importantly, a community engaging fire station for the city of Los Angeles.