Arch Tour Fest: HOLA Arts & Recreation Center | 2:00PM

Photo Credit: Tom Bonner

Arch Tour Fest: Heart of Los Angeles (HOLA) Arts & Recreation Center | 2:00PM

Arch Tour Fest – Full List of Tours Here

This is an in-person tour. Attendees will be required to show proof of vaccination. Please read and check the agreement and safety boxes in the registration. Additional information regarding the tour and check-in process will be emailed directed to registrants 24 hours before the event. Tickets are non-transferable.

Architecture Firm: Berliner Architects

CES Learning Units: 1 LU

Tickets Available Below & Passes Available Here

Opened in 2020 concurrently with COVID, the Heart of Los Angeles (HOLA) Arts & Recreation Center (ARC) was 10 years in the making. HOLA partnered with the LA Department of Recreation and Parks to develop an under-utilized corner of Lafayette Park for an after-school “Clubhouse.” This facility expands the non-profit’s STEAM programs to 4,000 underserved families, a 74% increase in youths ages 6-24 HOLA serves in the Rampart and Westlake Districts. Culver City-based Berliner Architects sustainably designed the ARC from 46 recycled shipping containers, nestling the building into a natural hillside to preserve usable park space and retain existing trees.

Using shipping containers as ARC’s primary building block minimizes construction waste and embodied energy, plus also accommodates future adaptation. The containers’ corrugated steel walls were removed to join them together, forming larger rooms as needed. ARC’s focal point is a hangar-style performance pavilion, which hosts the Los Angeles Philharmonic-affiliated Youth Orchestra LA (YOLA) and a community-based Intergenerational Orchestra. This space has a 30-foot-wide hangar door that opens to the park. A grassy hillock creates a natural amphitheater for planned or impromptu performances for audiences of park visitors.

The tour is led by ARC lead designer Richard Berliner, AIA, Principal of Berliner Architects. Berliner will show how the shipping containers were stacked to create the 25,000-square-foot ARC Clubhouse. The building was configured to house nine dedicated music rooms, 12 club rooms, three office areas, two lounges, a founders’ room, and the 2,185-square-foot performance pavilion. Honors for the HOLA ARC Clubhouse include a 2021 LA Business Council Education Award, a 2021 Westside Urban Forum Design Award, and a 2021 Construction Risk Partners Build America Award.

Design Architect: Berliner Architects
Interior Designer: David Dalton
Architect of Record: EDI International
Executive Architect: PVE Sheffler
General Contractor: Balfour Beatty
Landscape: Office of the Designed Landscape
MEP Engineers: Design West Engineering; ACIES Engineering
Structural Engineer: Structural Affiliates International (SAI)
Civil Engineer: Brandow & Johnston
Container Fabricator: SG Blocks

Tour Led By:

Richard Berliner, AIA – Principal, Berliner Architects

Richard Berliner, AIA, founded Berliner Architects in 1996 in Los Angeles with the ambitious goal of designing innovative schools that transform the landscape of education. Berliner and his firm constantly pursue new approaches to school design, including outdoor learning environments.

Growing up in New York City, Berliner admired the city’s skyscrapers. This fascination led him to earn a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Rhode Island School of Design. After college, Berliner moved to Los Angeles and worked at large architecture and design firms, where he designed the Biola University Library and the Humanities Building at California Lutheran University—his first forays into educational design.

Over the years, Richard Berliner has expanded Berliner Architects into civic and spiritual projects, custom residential and multi-family designs, production studios, and mixed-use buildings. In Los Angeles, the firm has created ground-up designs and updates to several public and charter schools, campus masterplans for clients including Pierce College and Valley College, and studio modernizations for Sony, Warner Bros, and others. Richard Berliner is an Accredited Learning Environment Professional (ALEP), a LEED Certified Professional, and is a member of California Coalition for Adequate School Housing, Urban Land Institute, and Society of College and University Planners.

Tony Brown – CEO, Heart of Los Angeles (HOLA)
Joining HOLA in 1993, Tony Brown has been on the organization’s board since 2006, serving as Executive Director and CEO. During the AIA Spring Tours, Tony will provide insights on the multi-year HOLA ARC project: how the organization worked with the city to identify Lafayette Park as a viable site and the background behind creating a dynamic after-school center from shipping containers. ARC now serves as the flagship for HOLA’s efforts to serve youth and families furthest away from resources. Earning a BA from Loyola Marymount and an MS from the University of Tennessee, Tony is a past recipient of an LA Business Journal Leadership Excellence Award and a James Irvine Foundation State of California Leadership Award. Further, he was named one of Town & Country’s Top 50 Philanthropists. Tony is active in several organizations, including the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, ExpandLA, the CA3 Advocacy Group, and the California Senate Rules Committee.

Learning Objectives:

+ Participants will learn how a public/private project was created through a partnership between community-based non-profit Heart of Los Angeles (HOLA) and the Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks.
+ Participants will learn about sustainable design and how shipping containers were creatively used as building blocks to construct the ARC Clubhouse.
+ Participants will learn how indoor and outdoor learning spaces were created, optimizing different kinds of pedagogy.
+ Participants will learn how ARC was strategically sited to enhance Lafayette Park, one of the city’s oldest public spaces.