7654321PHYSICAL VOIDPERCEPTUAL

VOIDPERCEPTUAL

VOID

.VELE .W.VELE .S

DN DN DN DN

DN DN

DN

UP UP UP PUPU

DN DN

(elevator lobby)

(elevator lobby)

semi-private roof accessprivate roof accesspublic circulationprivate circulationbedroom/bathroom/kitchenworklive

A B C D E F G

A B C D E F G

ROOLF HT11ROOLF HT21NALP FOOR

SECTION G

SECTION A

SECTION B

SECTION C

SECTION D

SECTION E

SECTION F

S B C L W

PU

BLIC

B C V

V

SWL B C VS

WL6.85’

7 65

443

2

1

765

32

1

7:30 a.m.- Dillon Shoomley, sole inhabitant of unit G wakes up.

8:00 a.m.- Mr. Shoomley bathes while humming the ambient melodies of a Morrissey tune to himself.

8:30 a.m- Preparing breakfast, Dillon catches a glimpse of old man Humperdink cooking a greasy heap of eggs and bacon in the adjacent unit F. 9:00: a.m.- A freelance graphic designer by day, Mr. Shoomley makes his way up to his home

office on the second level, stopping to adjust his portion of the shade structure overhead.

3:00 p.m.- On his way back down to the first level, Mr. Shoomley runs into Joan Jenson, a neighbor from unit D.

6:00 p.m.-Dillon invites Joan into his living room for a drink.

12 noon - Taking his afternoon break, Dillon walks up to the roof, looks out across the bustling expanse of downtown L.A., and takes in a deep breath of fresh air, tinged with the faint yet bitter taste of hydrocarbons. He ponders for a moment the meaning of existence.

8:00 p.m.-Dillon and Joan sit down for the evening news—they learn that the war has ended. It was a good day. They celebrate.

CLAUSTROPHORIA:

0 5 10 20

CONTEXT: 818 BROADWAY, DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES

As America’s aging urban fabric enters a new century, the adaptive reuse of existing buildings requires radically new modes of contextual agility and engagement than the tabula rasa’s of the past. The charge of converting the top two floors of the 80 year old Wirlitzer building in downtown into residential apartments takes as its starting point a spatial proportion similar to that of a loaf of bread. Whereas the minimum requirement of seven units might logically warrant a transverse strategy, generating a generous “slice of toast” for all, the following explores the seeming absurdity of the opposite approach: longitudinal incisions that offer the entire 150 foot length of the building, yet only 7 feet of its width. While this configuration places the parallel lives of its tenants in a spatial condition extreme thinness and proximity, another series of incisions provides a system of physical and phenomenological voids that bring in natural light and air, allow for verticalcirculation as well as activate extensive moments of shared visual transparency through the entire width of the building out to views of downtown. Beyond an isolated response to the existing conditions of a historic site, posited here is the calculated collision of claustrophobia and ecstasy in the generation of a new residential typology for the future that challenges the conventions (and increasing “bigness”) of American domestic space. The ecstasy of spatial thinness

PARALLEL LIVES IN RADICAL PROXIMITYINTERIOR EDGE UNIT