OFFICE TOWER IN CULVER CITY

OFFICE TOWER IN CULVER CITY DELUSION IN LOGIC

Project by Karim Khayati & Di Liang Eric Owen Moss Vertical Studio (DS 4000) SCI-Arc, Fall 2020 Location - Culver City, CA, USA Duration - 2 months Softwares - Rhino 3D, Grasshopper, Photoshop, Illustrator, CAD Height - 435 feet (133 meters) Floor Area - 300,000 Sqft ( 28,000 sqm) 22 Floors & 3 Underground

ELEVATIONS

North Elevation

40ft (12m)

40ft (12m)

South Elevation

40ft (12m)

40ft (12m)

CONCEPT

Located in Culver City at a height of 435 feet, the project stands out with its verticality within a height-restricted zone.

This project is a mixed-use tower programmed to host office spaces, residential apartment units, retail shops, and community areas. Our project has the desire to hybridize metaphoric forms with the use of rationality and logic.

The odd feeling between the interaction of different architectural forms raises questions about its identity. We perceive this project as an image of an isolated

town from thousands of years ago that grew and evolved with time.

The structural strategy was not only to make the tower achievable but also a way to make the interaction between different formal languages become

coherent. Since the idea results in a vertical town, we have established a gesture within the project by creating a staircase ‘high way’ that conducts human behavior, provides circulation within the heart of the building, and creates an outdoor/indoor experience.

STRUCTURE

North/East iso Steel Color Coded Diagram

South/West iso

CIRCULATION

North/East iso

* The highway is the highlight of the project; how to create a vertical town that grew throughout the year while incorporating a highway within in.

X-RAY ENVELOPE

North/East iso

* The structure of the project makes the different formal languages of the project become cohesive. The structure tends to obey and disobey to the overall massings, and that is the way to blurr its identity.

3D FLOOR PLANS

Residential Floor Plan iso

Cut at 310ft (95m)

Community Areas Floor Plan iso

Cut at 375ft (115m)

. MULHOLLAND

. CENTRAL LA . HOLLYWOOD SIGN

. GRIFFITH OBSERVATORY

. HOLLYWOOD

. SUNSET . WILSHER

. SILVER LAKE

. INTERSTATE 10

. DTLA

. USC CAMPUS

. CULVER CITY

1/193 ARCHITECTURE IS A LINE

Thesis Project & Research by Karim Khayati Graduate Thesis Project at SCI-Arc, SU 2021 Thesis Advisor Tom Wiscombe Location - SeaPort District, NY, USA Duration - 4 months Softwares - Rhino 3D, Grasshopper, Photoshop Height - 1000 feet (305 meters) Floor Area - 850,000 Sqft ( 85,000 sqm) 80 Floors & a Forest

CONCEPT

Starting with the thesis title which is a fraction number. This fraction is a ratio used in architecture to give a number on how slender a building is. The ratio in many cases is the XY plane of a mass in relation to the Z plane. According to research, a building is considered slim or slender if its ratio is between 1/7 and 1/12. For precedent, 432 Park Avenue located in New York has an X equal to Y with 93 ft and a Z of 1400ft. Thus its slenderness ratio is 1/15, which is considered super-slender. However, this

thesis is not the exploration of height in regards to the floor plate, nor exploring the possibilities of how tall and

slender a building can be. This thesis actually expresses interest in an architecture that starts with a line, then a ratio, then transformed into a silhouette. The thesis starts with a line. Its dimension can be undetermined or unlimited, but for this thesis, the dimension is 2 miles. This line is given a rectangular thickness of 40ft by 70ft, which is a golden section ratio. So in relation to the precedent, this ratio is 13 times smaller, with a ratio of 1/193, thus the thesis title. This ratio is then folded creating several abstracted silhouettes of mountain peaks, then wrapped around itself several times creating a centralized clustered space within it.

NEW SKYSCRAPER?

As we approach the last 5 years, it has been noticeable that the recent New York City Towers are getting slimmer and slimmer. Looking at 432 Park Avenue and 111 West 57th Street, their XYZ is similar with a floor plate of 93 square by 1400ft in height. This raises the

question of; is slenderness in architecture a design choice and intent? Or is it simply the design result derived from site dimensioning, regulations, and air rights? If the future of skyscrapers is regulated to be slender, this raises also the question of; how much slender is too slender? How does it affect the interior space? its spatial use? its program and its functionality?

1/193 x GODZILLA DETAILED CHUNK

1/193 is not a project that imposes itself with height. It is a vision of a thesis project that starts with

the idea of architecture as a line. An impossible slenderness ratio that was later transformed into

a strong abstracted graphic silhouette, which was later on positioned on the Hudson River in New York City. 1/193 sits on a water forest, an idea that emerges from having a waterfront meditative green space within a super-dense city, offering nature where it is lacking. I would like to also mention that this project at a larger scale interacts with the FDR freeway drivers, the sidewalk pedestrians, the Brooklyn bridge users, the boats and fishermen roaming through the Hudson River, and the city of New York itself.

1/193 x GODZILLA 2D & 3D PLANS