Archinect - News

SWA and HKS construct park over Dallas highway to reconnect historically divided neighborhood

2023-05-24T11:04:00-04:00

SWA has unveiled the design, undertaken with HKS, for a major urban infrastructure project which seeks to reconnect a historically Black neighborhood in South Dallas. The Southern Gateway Public Green comprises a five-acre park in the Oak Cliff neighborhood of Dallas, built to reconnect a community that was divided by highway construction in the 1950s.

Image credit: HKS

The park will be delivered in two phases, with infrastructure currently under construction to ‘cap’ the highway to allow the landscape to be built overhead. The finished scheme will feature event spaces, a market-style dining and retail area, and lawns.

Image credit: HKS

“SWA’s design was based on public feedback and reflects the neighboring communities that will benefit from it on a daily basis—communities that historically haven’t gotten a lot of say in what happens to them,” the firm said about the scheme. “It will also be home to a variety of native plants and trees, as well as educational exhibits about the histor...

SWA unveils plans for new 1,200-acre park in Irvine, California

2023-04-28T13:57:00-04:00

A new master plan led by SWA Group has been revealed by the city of Irvine, California, showcasing a park design that, at 1,200 acres, would create one of the largest municipal park environments in the nation.

The so-called Irvine Great Park would transform the site of the historic former Marine Corps’ El Toro Air Station into what could evolve into a new national landmark for the 3.16 million residents of Orange County replete with educational offerings, modern sport and recreation facilities, and cultural attractions.

The framework SWA developed in unison with Kellenberg Studio calls for a five-zone subdivision of the site. A 200-acre Sports Park, Cultural Terrace, 60-acre Botanical Garden, and Veteran’s Memorial Park will join a linear park called the Bosque that features trails and a children’s play area. A central “Heart of the Park” zone completes the spatial design, featuring the 12,000-seat Great Park Amphitheater, a farm, and a three-tiered, 22-acre system of small lakes.

A...

SWA Group to develop the Port of LA's waterfront connectivity plan

2022-12-22T12:39:00-05:00

SWA Group has announced plans to transform parts of America’s biggest container port, the Port of Los Angeles (POLA), in a project aimed at increasing connectivity in the public access realm.

“The San Pedro Waterfront is on its way to becoming a truly world-class destination, and we believe that much of it depends on connectivity,” SWA’s Co-CEO Gerdo Aquino explained in a statement. “It will be transformative to enhance accessibility for locals and visitors alike, to create an easily navigable multi-modal waterfront.”

In the hopes of “aiding its evolution over the next 50 years,” Aquino’s team of engineers and other project consultants will work to activate the waterfront area while compiling a comprehensive mobility strategy that links different nodes along eight miles of potentially accessible waterfront edges and a 460-acre swath of land.

Image courtesy SWA Group

The scope of the project will incorporate cruise terminals, the historic San Pedro Ferry Building, Cabrillo Marine Aqu...

A decade after the tragedy, SWA Group unveils memorial to Sandy Hook victims as a center of reflection

2022-11-14T15:23:00-05:00

Ten years removed from the tragic shooting that claimed the lives of 27 school children and teachers in Newtown, Connecticut, SWA Group has today officially unveiled a permanent memorial to the victims, called The Clearing, that will seek to heal the community, survivors, and family members still in search of justice in their tight-knit New England town.

Located on a five-acre parcel of donated land near the replacement for the now demolished former elementary school, the design for the memorial keys on three elements integrated into interconnected paths that bring visitors through a circuitry of woodlands, meadows, and a water feature intended to “honor the process of grieving and remembrance.”

Photo: Neil Landino

SWA says: “The Sandy Hook Memorial differs from other memorials in that it was publicly funded and completely community-led. It is also primarily landscape rather than a monument. Memorials are typically embedded in landscape rather than having landscape as the focus. The ...

California's inventory of disused strip malls may be an overlooked option to shore up its housing stock by 2030

2022-05-02T12:35:00-04:00

Converting empty or underutilized strip malls and shopping centers into mixed-use residential and retail developments could help solve California’s housing shortage crisis and allow stores to stay afloat amid the shift to online shopping, said housing experts and industry leaders during a panel at the Urban Land Institute’s spring meeting last week in San Diego. However, that transformation will require cities to change their land-use policies.

Greyfield land may be the most underutilized resource in the state’s harried attempt to create the more than 2.5 million housing units required to meet demands set forth by the Department of Housing and Community Development in March. A bill introduced last week by state rep Buffy Wicks would include them along with disused offices and environmentally unhealthy parking lot spaces in a zoning update that could allow developers to make relatively quick conversions into mixed-use sites with job-site provisions for apprenticeship employment.

With a portion of the state's population moving east, the measure has the most potential in embattled urban areas like LA or San Diego. According to a report from UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation, around 40% of the state’s 50 largest cities do not allow for residential development on designated commercial plots currently....

Laguarda.Low Architects designs verdant mixed-use park in Shenzhen

2021-08-26T14:48:00-04:00

New York-based Laguarda.Low Architects has designed a sprawling 128-acre, mixed-use park in Shenzhen that aims to restore the city’s Bao’an district “to its former high level of livability.”

The OCT OH Bay Waterfront Retail Park, which opened in February of this year, joins the new Shenzhen International Airport, new government headquarters, and cultural facilities. The park is on a three-quarter-mile waterfront site, split into four primary zones: east and west waterfront retail park, urban business center, and Waterfront Cultural Park. A natural landscape intertwines with the built settings, dissected by pedestrian paths.

Entertainment venues, leisure facilities, and a performing arts center are all featured, emanating from an expansive open-air plaza. An abundance of natural light and “choreographed circulation,” as stated by the architects, redefine the traditional shopping experience.

The urban business center features terraced office buildings and a hotel that provide views ...

Newtown, CT approves SWA's plans for a Sandy Hook Memorial ahead of the tragedy’s tenth anniversary

2021-06-17T12:10:00-04:00

A new memorial to victims of the Sandy Hook shooting has been approved following a referendum vote in Connecticut that finalized the project after nearly three years of cost-related delays.

View of fountain. Image courtesy SWA Group.

The memorial is adjacent to the new Sandy Hook Elementary campus and will open on the tenth anniversary of the shooting in December of next year.

Aerial view. Image courtesy SWA Group.

SWA’s 2018 design for The Clearing will invite visitors into the 5-acre donated space via a network of paths surrounded by meadows and centered by a sycamore tree at the base of a water feature set upon a granite base. The garden plan was approved unanimously by a memorial committee after a competition yielded 189 different entries for what will eventually be dedicated as Connecticut’s second gun-violence related memorial in as many years.

Site plan. Image courtesy SWA Group.

The state legislature also voted this month to approve a bond package that would contribute $2.6 mi...

SWA Group helps plant 300 blooming trees in tribute to late Congressman John Lewis in Atlanta

2021-02-23T12:31:00-05:00

Through its master planning effort for Atlanta’s Freedom Park, SWA Group is participating in "Flowering Forest – A Tree Tribute to Civil Rights Leader John Lewis," a collaborative, living memorial to the late Congressman and Civil Rights leader, to be located in the park. John Lewis was instrumental in establishing Freedom Park, which is located at the heart of where the national Civil Rights movement was born.

The living memorial to Lewis is the culmination of a three-day volunteer planting project that took in mid-February in which 300 blooming trees were planted at his namesake plaza in Atlanta. The Freedom Park Conservancy, Trees Atlanta, and The National Center for Civil and Human Rights all participated in the event.

Freedom Park Master Plan. 1. John Lewis Plaza; 2. Lake Lewis; 3. “Flowering Forest” Tree Tribute; 4. John Lewis Freedom Parkway Garden. Courtesy SWA Group.

SWA assisted with the overall vision of the tribute. Landscape architects at SWA also assisted with the selec...

SWA Group makes progress on new mixed-use sculptural plaza in Guangzhou, China

2020-11-16T17:04:00-05:00

Landscape architecture firm SWA Group has completed all of the ground level work including several sculptural pieces for Jianhua Plaza in Guangzhou, China. The Plaza's 1.4-hectare landscape was developed as part of the Baiyun New City Plan.

SWA's landscape concept focused on developing a robust dialogue between the project's "ultra-modern" architectural forms and the landscape's softer, more organic geometries. The east portion of the site was completed and opened to the public in July this year.

The site consists of two towers. One tower will be the future headquarters for Jianhua Building Materials Group, and the other will be comprised of residential penthouses. A retail podium will create a central courtyard between the two towers.

Sandy Hook memorial design by SWA Group takes a step forward

2019-12-30T20:13:00-05:00

“The themes of nature, rebirth and regrowth made it perfect for a landscape memorial,” said Affleck. They aimed to incorporate plants and materials that fit seamlessly into Connecticut’s natural environment, like the sycamore tree. The designers also spent time discussing grief with people in their own lives who have experienced it. They came to the conclusion that everyone heals differently.

A proposal created by Ben Waldo and Dan Affleck of SWA Group in San Francisco has been selected as the winning design for the Sandy Hook memorial in Connecticut. The memorial design features a circular reflecting pool at the center surrounded by peaceful gardens and meandering pathways that will allow visitors to "engage with the site in a way that is unique to them,” Waldo says in the Hartford Courant. If Newtown residents vote to fund the memorial, construction will start in December 2020. Plans call for the memorial to open to the public on December 14, 2021.

Waldo and Affleck's design was “universally loved” by the victims’ families, the memorial commission chair Daniel Krauss told the Courant.

At-Risk: the Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters

2016-11-01T23:45:00-04:00

However, the open-ended zoning agreement the city and Weyerhaeuser Company signed 22 years ago allows new development to be governed by codes from that era, which would permit up to 70 percent of the campus to be covered with impervious surfaces and gives a city department director the power to determine what unlisted uses can be allowed.

Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters, Federal Way, WA - Photo courtesy of SWA

ICYMI, last month TCLF announced their latest Landslide: for a Northwestern Modernist Gem. The concern? Weyerhaeuser Corporate Headquarters designed by Sasaki, Walker & Associates, sold earlier this year, to Industrial Realty Group (IRG) for $70.5 million.

Quadratic super-plaza Foundry Square near completion

2013-09-03T15:32:00-04:00

The Foundry Square, a four-part mixed-use complex in San Francisco's South of Market (SoMa) district, is currently in its final phase with the construction of Foundry III, which developer Tishman Speyer purchased in 2012. The target LEED Gold building will have 265,000 square feet of office space and 10,000 square feet for retail. Foundry III will be San Francisco's first new ground-up office building since pre-recession in 2007.

STUDIOS Architecture and SWA Group began designing the quadratic complex for the City of San Francisco/Wilson Equity Office over a decade ago--with the buildings numbered out of sequence as they were constructed one by one. The client's goal for the complex was to create an "active people-place" while providing ample office and retail space. Current tenants in the square include Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP, BlackRock Inc., and Gymboree headquarters.

As its name states, each 10-story low-rise structure of the 1.25 million sq.foot complex o...