Since the 1970s, Art Center College of Design’s hillside campus in Pasadena has been housed in an iconic building designed by mid-century architect Craig Ellwood. In recent years, the school is beginning to outgrow its existing accommodation due to the demands of the curriculum and growth of the student population. The goal of the project was to develop a long-term expansion plan for the Art Center’s hillside campus – with developments to be phased over a number of years, beginning with the refurbishment of the Ellwood Building.
In 2000, we began work on the new campus master plan in collaboration with the office of Alvaro Siza from Portugal. Siza was to design a new technical skills complex, and the office was to design a new library building. These two projects would allow spaces within the Ellwood Building to be repurposed. Unfortunately, this master plan was put on hold after 9/11 (like so many architectural projects in the US).
In 2005, the project was resurrected, this time without the participation of Siza. The new project was more modest in scope - combining the library and the technical skills complex into a single new building. In keeping with the spirit of our first master plan, we decided to locate the new facility adjacent to entrance of the existing Ellwood Building, overlooking a ravine.
The technical skills complex was to be expressed as a series of solid rectilinear volumes distributed around the library. An internal street was to link the library with the studios, and could also be used as a gallery for student exhibitions.
We retained the essence of the earlier library design in the new facility. Its terracing structure allowed the book-stacks to be placed in the enclosed areas under the terraces and be protected from exposure to direct sun; while the reading areas would be located on the open terraces under a glass roof to enjoy the benefit of natural light. The glass roof would have environmentally treated glass to reduce solar glare and heat gain.
It was our hope that the more sculptural profile of the new facility would help to establish the building’s own identity whilst complimenting the linearity of the Ellwood building.
The projects in this section were designed and executed during my time at Gehry Partners LLP (the office). I am grateful to Mr. Gehry and the team at the office for their generosity and support over the years. All intellectual property rights of these projects continue to be owned by the office unless otherwise mentioned. The narrative texts on the projects are entirely personal, they do not represent the views or opinions of the office, its clients or any other third party or organization.