This was a studio project in collaboration with Disney Imagineering to rethink the urban interaction along first street in downtown Los Angeles.
In urban:HARVEST, the goal was to harvest the diversity of Los Angeles through the cultivation of culture and food. To do this, innovative methods of design and cultural points of interest were introduced into the diverse Downtown Los Angeles area to create a district that stood on its own as a culmination of that diversity, a “green” district. Social interaction and Food production were key concepts. Five key ideas were implemented to support these concepts. One of which was urban:DICHOTOMY. The title is referring to the relationship of 2 monuments of the times, on common ground. The new skyscraper in Los Angeles would be a self-sustaining system of food production with over one hundred housing units and close to 10 acres of office space. It would use passive energy saving methods, energy production systems, outdoor public spaces, and introduce ground level retail and multipurpose facilities. Most importantly, it sits on common ground, stitched with another monument of early Los Angeles, City Hall.
In early Los Angeles, the city was in perpetual crisis and needed civic leadership to become the metropolis that it is today. From this, emerged City Hall. It was a response to a societal crisis and a necessary part of the city vernacular. Today, Los Angeles needs a response to a new crisis, and needs to speak a new language. By 2050, 80% of the world’s population, which will be 9 billion, will have moved into metropolises. That puts over 7,000,000 in Los Angeles alone. For this reason, new solutions need to be introduced to allow for population growth and anticipate the strain on food supply, green space, housing, and most importantly energy. For this, vertical farms must be constructed to free up the almost 500,000,000 acres of land the United States alone uses for agriculture. If cities are growing food inside buildings pesticides are no longer needed, food can be grown organically, and the two thousand miles of fossil fuels every apple traveled to reach your hand are conserved because your food is growing around the corner. This new system would be a self sustaining system, for the future.