Hope Doesn't End at The Ten

Monday morning heat and construction crews didn’t stop ceremonial groundbreaking of The New Carver Apartments, the first Skid Row Housing Trust Project in Downtown L.A.'s South Park. Inset: Michael Maltzan.

The New Carver Apartments will be a six-story 95-unit complex sitting on a fragmented parcel where 17th Street bends into a part of South Hope that was cut off by the 10 and 110 freeways, a lost corner of Downtown. The plan to provide a first step for supportive housing solutions for homeless hospital patients released in Skid Row, making some of the units the first to be designed with the intent  to receive patients with a immediate hospital release, also known as "patient dumping."

It was the “patient dumping” and needed affordable housing adaptable for disabled residents that prompted this joint City, State, non-profit, and developer project. It since enabled by CRA, seen through by Jan Perry, and steered by Skid Row Housing Trust, making the complex filled with social and architectural ambition.

Designed by the firm Michael Maltzan Architecture, the apartments sit in a saw toothed cylinder on a fragmented parcel next to a bend in the road. Rather than retreating and hiding the disabled, the introduced project will engage both building and resident with the rest of Downtown. It gives Micheal Maltzan the chance to answer his own question that he posed just before the ground breaking:  “How do buildings not shrink from their responsibility of being part of the city?”

This building takes on that burden of responsibility.  By providing an entrance that leads into an open courtyard, shared by all units, it allows residents to witness the city daily through windows maximizing natural light, a view of street and skyline connecting the exterior and interior space.

Glancing toward the freeway from his vantage point, Maltzan adds “The building is also designed to appear like it's rotating as you drive by.” At the same level of the 10 Freeway and with the help of acoustic engineers, windows to the laundry and community room will be positioned so residents to share a rare city view; cars passing by with no noise.

For some, The New Carver Apartments is shaped to resemble a gear. Yet, from renderings of the upper floors seen from above almost has the look of a seashell––an organic shaped shelter that keeps the occupant safe from predators and still allows them to remain active in their own home.

Middle: View of upper floor plan. Below: Renderings of The New Carver Apartments from Hope and 17th. Community room windows will be on the 3rd floor offering residents a view of the 10 Freeway.

 

Comments

[health advocate]

it is great that everyone is trying to do their part to better the community

[les]

Helping the community and including homeless is powerful thing everyone needs opportunities in life. At the same time will the residents currently living in the area be safe. Who will be watching after them specially if there are mental problems involved.