The redevelopment of the 9-acre property will dramatically increase open space, create lavish gardens, relocate all parking underground and remove unsightly elements, totally transforming the site from one in which concrete prevails to a welcoming, park-like environment. The architectural design will represent California luxury life-style, celebrating the climate and indoor/outdoor living though extensive transparency and connectivity between interior and exterior landscaped spaces. All the new buildings will feature extensive glass areas and open balconies, and will conform to LEED standards.

The existing Beverly Hilton Hotel, designed by Welton Becket and completed in 1955, will be enhanced with a new, celebratory tree-lined entrance. The plan includes upgraded rooms and a new pool area. All of the existing and new hotel roofs will be intensely landscaped, affording views from all floors of planted roof murals. The new Waldorf-Astoria Hotel will mark the intersection of Wilshire and Santa Monica Boulevards. It will be a multi-faceted glass and warm gray limestone clad, articulated structure with a cobble-stoned arrival piazza and garden. Fronting the corner will be a new restaurant and a major sculpture, announcing and anchoring the gateway.

The two new condominium buildings are conceived as a pair of coupled, stepped structures. They will be cladded in glass and silver gray aluminum panels. Their facades flank the Beverly Hilton Hotel entry drive, reinforcing its renewed presence. Finally, the masterplan greatly improves traffic flow and circulation in and around the site. By literally pulling back the property edges, the plan allows for two new lanes along Wilshire Boulevard and one new lane along Santa Monica Boulevard.

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The building’s asymmetrical form was conceived as a freestanding, three-dimensional object, an obelisk, placed within the existing space, establishing a sense of place. At ground level, the base of the tower responds to the urban framework maintaining a pedestrian street wall.

The dynamic, curvilinear shape and glass façade provide a strong contrast to the rectilinear masonry buildings that surround it. The building intentionally creates the effect of a kaleidoscope, mirroring fractional and fragmented images of neighboring structures day and night. Perceptions of both the play of light and the building’s form vary depending upon the vantage point.

At the rear of the site, the 4,500-square foot public plaza, facing Cooper Square, provides a spatial extension to the square. Its furnishings include benches, chairs and tables with inlaid chess boards. An adjoining raised, tree planted landscaped buffer, provides a physical separation from the residential entry on Lafayette Street.

Associate Architect: Ismael Leyva Architects

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The firm’s two condominium structures, notable for their contemporary, urban image, have views of the entire complex, from the golf course to the ocean.

The club’s master plan calls for a mega-yacht marina bordered by five- and six-story residential buildings, the majority of which will open directly onto the marina’s edge, providing a short walk from the boat dock to condo. Community amenities include an 18-hole championship golf course, yacht club, beach club, fitness center, a variety of sports programs and support facilities as well as a system of parks and green spaces.

The first floor in each of the six-story buildings contains a lobby, retail stores, a parking garage and mechanical spaces. On the floors above, the apartment sizes range from one- to four-bedrooms, with penthouses offering five and six bedrooms.

The apartment and penthouse layouts feature open living/dining and entertainment areas with floor-to-ceiling windows that offer panoramic views of the outdoors. Generously sized bedrooms have windows recessed in the walls. Balconies on almost every floor wrap around the marina-side facades and provide an additional outdoor room.

The facades have a limestone base with painted stucco walls and aluminum window walls. Shaped roofs create a distinctive profile for passersby and provide a high vaulted ceiling for the penthouses. Visitors enter a lobby with a limestone floor, teak wood paneling, plaster walls and a metal ceiling. The kitchens feature wood and metal cabinets with stone tops and backsplashes; the baths have stone floors as well as stone vanities and bathtub tops.

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The lower Park Avenue South location, just north of Union Square and west of Gramercy Park, has become one of New York City’s most sought after residential neighborhoods. With views along Park Avenue South towards the east and southern views along 19th Street, the unit layouts for the building take advantage of this important corner location. All apartments have their major living spaces oriented towards these views. Additionally, several of the upper floors have unobstructed views to the north and west.

Zoning requirements limited the street wall height to 150 feet, requiring a facade setback that advantageously allows for the creation of private terraces for the 14th floor units. The 17th floor penthouse, occupying the entire floor, has exclusive access to the building roof where a private terrace and swimming pool has been provided.

The exterior of the building is designed to compliment the existing neighborhood context. The facade is composed of limestone clad, pre-cast concrete panels that create large scale, two-story openings in-filled with windows and metal panel floor spandrels. The articulation of column and spandrel panels recalls the detailing and materials of adjacent neighboring buildings.

Additional residential amenities provided for owners include both a spa and exercise room, along with a group function room and library with access to an outdoor terrace.

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The Bello Center’s primary spaces are organized within a glass enclosed, double-height pavilion structure, which orients to the new campus quad. In the evening, the center radiates light and provides views into its facilities from the campus.

The library, which occupies a major portion of the building, provides for the introduction of state-of-the-art, electronic information services, classrooms and study rooms that formerly had not been available. It will also accommodate the growth of the library’s current collection of 140,000 items including books, bound journals, audio-visual materials and microfilm.

The other portion of the building is devoted to the Grand Hall entry rotunda and other spaces complementary to the library. The two-story entrance serves as a central campus meeting place, special events venue and exhibition center. The Grand Hall and the library both connect to a cybercafé, library classrooms and the Academic Center for Excellence, all of which remain open to students and offer study spaces and electronic access when the library is closed.

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The 22,000-square-foot museum is a multiple volume, single-level structure clad in zinc panels and French limestone. A large, naturally lit sculpture gallery is the organizing element for a sequence of 18-feet-high gallery spaces with state-of-the-art museum environmental controls, and an administrative office suite. The sculpture gallery is also the gathering space for receptions and special events and opens onto a terrace overlooking the pond and grounds. Support space to one side of the galleries includes high-density art storage, temporary holding space, a service dock and a catering kitchen.

Visitors to Glenstone must first pass through the entry gatehouse, then drive along a maple tree-lined road, passing between two commissioned sculptures by Richard Serra and Tony Smith. The cobblestone entry court, anchored by another Richard Serra piece, has views of the pond and a commissioned Ellsworth Kelly totem sculpture which acts as the site’s fulcrum.

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Visitors enter the building through a portico adjacent to a reflecting pool and arrive in the main lobby and prefunction space. Both of the centers are classic rotunda forms. The larger Main Center seats approximately 250 people, with the smaller Meditation Center seating 40. While most of the building’s exterior is clad in limestone, the centers’ exterior walls are clad in brick, helping to articulate the spaces.

The Main Center is 30-feet-tall, its circular form extending above the building’s 16-foot-high roofline. The wood paneled seating space opens onto a rectangular sanctuary with a raised wood platform with a backdrop of a ceiling-to-floor water wall. Its large, curved entry pocket doors open onto the foyer, allowing the center to accommodate larger crowds for special holy day services and other occasions.

Throughout the facility, there is the contrast of curvilinear, rectangular and square forms. A square monitor roof tops the larger rotunda, with curved windows on each of its four sides bringing light into the space. An open porch to one side of the Main Center extends onto a terrace, creating a quiet outdoor campus room.

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The Jewish Children’s Museum is a unique institution where children and their parents—from all segments of the community—can explore their history and heritage in a stimulating, interactive environment. It also provides the non-Jewish world with a forum for understanding the Jewish community and its contributions to history and culture.

Visitors enter the lobby and information area on the ground floor, which also houses a cafeteria and museum shop. The Interactive Computer Arcade on the lower level is devoted primarily to hands-on learning: it contains dozens of interactive creativity workshops, as well as an arts and crafts center.

In the galleries occupying the third and fourth of the building’s six floors, visitors encounter an array of exhibits and displays covering Jewish history and heroes, holidays and customs, the Holocaust, and contemporary Jewish life. On the second level, a flexible, 2,700 square foot area alternates as a gallery, concert hall and banquet room. The top two floors of the Museum holds administrative offices, a conference room and support services.

Gwathmey Siegel Kaufman’s design invokes sustainable, contemporary materials and a high-tech infrastructure to offset and complement the Museum’s narratives of ongoing tradition.

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The new 35,000 square foot facility includes exhibition galleries, a multi-purpose auditorium, painting and ceramics studios, an arts research library and an outdoor sculpture court. Support facilities include a museum shop, art storage areas, a cafe, and staff offices.

The site is exceptional not only because of its history—with remains of trenches from the Civil War battle in which the Union forces captured the city of Wilmington—but also due to its location at the confluence of two major regional arteries (Independence Boulevard and 17th Street). The building serves as its own “signage” for the entire institution.

Associate Architect: Boney Architects

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