Those holding their breath in anticipation of seeing Herzog & de Meuron’s 6AM project—developed by Irvine, California–based developer SunCal and located in Los Angeles’s booming Arts District neighborhood—anytime soon are in for a long wait. Why? Because according to a preliminary report filed with the Los Angeles City Planning Department (LACPD), the $2 billion development is not expected to be completed until 2035.
As reported by Urbanize.LA, the multi-phase project (the firm’s first in Los Angeles) is due to ultimately contain, among other components, a pair of articulated, 58-story housing towers. The project’s initial environmental report indicates that 6AM will function like a small-scale city, complete with a large grocery store, arts spaces, offices, a school, and other diversely-programed amenities, all developed, according to the document, in “a range of building types and heights that are based on the existing building typologies” and crafted from “rough, ‘authentic’ and typical industrial construction materials.”
The 2,824,245-square foot complex will ultimately contain a total of 1,305 apartments, 412 hotel rooms, 431 condominium units, 253,514-square-feet of office space, an approximately 29,316-square-foot school, approximately 127,609 square feet of community-serving retail, and 22,429 square feet of art space. The project will be organized as a porous, mid-rise, mixed-use district on the ground floor, with the arts programs, school, commercial areas, offices and live/work lofts organized in a set of gridded blocks topped by a 40-foot-tall concrete platform. The four-story-tall platform—articulated in renderings that accompany the report by square-shaped, exposed concrete piers—will act as a tabletop for a second layer of program to be located directly above, mainly apartments.
Generally speaking, those apartments are to be organized along five of the six linear bands that run from north to south along the short dimension of the 15-acre site. The band closest to the Alameda Street-fronting towers will contain office spaces throughout. The apartment blocks will contain a mix of unit sizes, with a section along Mill Street dedicated to hotel uses. The apartments, like the two towers at the opposite end of the site along Alameda, will look down on the ground floor areas via a series of openings designed into the concrete tabletop structure. Those towers, made up of a bundled set or square floor plates arranged at staggered heights, will rise along Alameda Street beside a potential light rail line to be built to Artesia in southeast Los Angeles. The lowest section of the northern tower is also being designed to contain a hotel.
- Building 1, located at the corner of 6th and Mill Street will contain a 152-room hotel and 22,429 square feet of arts programming. The 118-foot-tall structure will contain a hotel-focused “amenity deck” along the eighth floor. This building will also contain an undisclosed number of apartment units.
- Building 2, also 118 feet tall, will contain 245 condominiums atop the platform and approximately 41,852 square feet of retail along the lower levels. It is anticipated that this block will contain the site’s aforementioned grocery store in the lower shopping area, as well as restaurants and live/work units. This block will contain residential amenities at the fourth level and along the rooftop.
- Building 3 would rise to 110 feet in height and contain 532 apartments above the table top, with 62,966 square feet of retail functions underneath, including potentially, a food market hall, restaurants. The tabletop area is due to contain outdoor amenities, including a swimming pool. The under-table areas are also being designed to contain apartments and up to 21 live/work units.
- Building 4 will house 251 apartments, 17 live/work units and a 29,316-square-foot school. The planning document indicates the school program may exist in any number of configurations, including as a private or hybrid private/public school and will serve up to 300 K-12 students.
- Building 5 will rise to 126 feet in height and will contain 253,514-square feet of office uses.
- Building 6 would rise 58 stories to a maximum height of 732 feet and would include 186 condominiums, 260 hotel rooms and 7,020 square feet of retail that will share the below-table areas with residential and hotel lobby areas.
- Building 7 will rise to 710 feet in height and will include 522 apartment units and 7,228 square feet of commercial areas.
The building is also due to contain a whopping 3,441 parking stalls, as well as 298 short term and 1,889 long-term bicycle parking spaces. Mia Lehrer & Associates will be providing landscape architecture services for the project, while AC Martin will serve as executive architect. 6AM is expected to be built in three phases starting around 2018.
