Follow this tag to curate your own personalized Activity Stream and email alerts.
After wrangling over the future of California’s high-speed rail, state lawmakers plan to release a critical batch of money to finish a bullet train in the Central Valley while also establishing an inspector general to audit the beleaguered project and authorizing billions of dollars in new money for rail plans across the state. — The Mercury News
Following a sizable $97.5 billion state budget surplus, California lawmakers last week agreed to allocate $4.2 billion in bond funds needed to finish the ambitious high-speed rail project's 171-mile Central Valley portion which is expected to connect Bakersfield with Merced by 2030, according to... View full entry
Following last week’s visit to Toronto’s Yabu Pushelberg, we are moving our Meet Your Next Employer series to Los Angeles where we find TOLO Architecture. Founded in 1998 by Peter Tolkin, the firm was renamed TOLO in 2018 after Sarah Lorenzen joined as a principal. Throughout... View full entry
In 1958, Frank Lloyd Wright broke a personal record with a cottage he designed for Seth Peterson, a longtime admirer of his work. At just 880 square feet, the home along Mirror Lake, in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, is the smallest residential building Wright ever touched. But it isn’t his smallest structure. Instead, that honour goes to a doghouse, which Wright conceived in the mid 1950s and is now on display at the Marin Civic Center, in San Rafael, California. — House & Garden
In the early 1950s, Robert and Gloria Berger commissioned Wright to design a Usonian-style home for their family in San Anselmo, California. In 1956, their 12-year-old son, Jim Berger, wrote to Wright asking for plans for a matching doghouse for his Labrador... View full entry
ZGF Architects has unveiled details of its Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, which has just broken ground in Los Angeles. The 200,000-square-foot facility will house 150 exhibits across three multi-level galleries and will serve as the permanent home of Space Shuttle Endeavour, one of three... View full entry
The Los Angeles City Council have passed a motion instructing several city departments to begin work on a framework that would require all new residential and commercial buildings in the city to be built to achieve zero-carbon emissions. Passed on May 27th, the motion may see a roadmap to... View full entry
New York-based SHoP has completed work on the Uber Headquarters in San Francisco. The 423,000-square-foot project is divided into two buildings ranging between six and eleven stories, linked by two suspended walkways. Photo © Jason O'Rear Photo © Jason O'Rear The scheme’s star... View full entry
IKEA U.S. has teamed up with SunPower, a California-based solar technology and energy services provider, to launch a new program called Home Solar with IKEA. Through this collaboration, members of the IKEA Family customer loyalty program will be able to purchase home solar solutions, available... View full entry
A new Silicon Valley startup is taking the charge put forth by the recent expansion of ADUs and other non-traditional forms of accommodation in the uphill battle to provide affordable housing to the millions of Californians struggling to find a way forward. Business Insider recently took a closeup... View full entry
Google has announced the opening of its new Bay View campus in Mountain View, California, with the neighboring Charleston East project in its final phase of construction. Together, they form the latest additions to Google's headquarters. Photo: Iwan Baan, courtesy of Google The web giant... View full entry
When a recession hits, architects often take it in the gut. The design sector has traditionally been one of the losers of a market downturn, with big real estate developments being put on hold and the need for architectural design services kicked down the road. But during the economic downturn brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, architecture has been surprisingly robust. — Fast Company
According to the 2022 Otis College Report on the Creative Economy, an annual report by Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles that tracks the economic health of creative industries in California, architecture has been the most resilient sector. This is compared to creative goods and... View full entry
A new draft plan by the California Air Resources Board was released on Tuesday that lays out an ambitious roadmap for achieving carbon neutrality in the state by 2045. Called the 2022 Climate Change Scoping Plan, the guide highlights the necessity for a comprehensive shift away from fossil... View full entry
Fentress Architects has been chosen by California State Parks and the California Indian Heritage Center Task Force to design the California Indian Heritage Center (CIHC) in Sacramento. Per a press announcement, the site will be a destination where “visitors from across California, the... View full entry
Golden Gate Park's John F. Kennedy Drive has been blocked off to vehicle traffic since the start of the pandemic, and on Tuesday night San Francisco's Board of Supervisors voted to keep it that way. — SFGate
A meeting with the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency last week resulted in the board voting 7-4 in favor of Mayor London Breed’s legislation to permanently close off a 1.5-mile-long stretch of the roadway to car traffic. In April 2020, the section of JFK Drive was closed to... View full entry
Converting empty or underutilized strip malls and shopping centers into mixed-use residential and retail developments could help solve California’s housing shortage crisis and allow stores to stay afloat amid the shift to online shopping, said housing experts and industry leaders during a panel at the Urban Land Institute’s spring meeting last week in San Diego. However, that transformation will require cities to change their land-use policies. — Smart Cities Dive
Greyfield land may be the most underutilized resource in the state’s harried attempt to create the more than 2.5 million housing units required to meet demands set forth by the Department of Housing and Community Development in March. A bill introduced last week by state rep Buffy Wicks would... View full entry
Just north of the SR-134 Freeway in Burbank, vertical construction is all but finished for the Warner Bros. Second Century expansion, and exterior finishes are climbing the hulking concrete buildings. — Urbanize Los Angeles
In August of last year, it was reported that the concrete frames of the Frank Gehry-designed project had risen. Now, as seen through new photos, the exterior finishes of the Warner Bros. Second Century expansion, which resembles staggered blocks, look to be reaching completion. The project is set... View full entry
