Elegant Density?
The mayor has used the phrase "elegant density" to describe well designed and perhaps even stylish big development needed to house a growing population. Well, instead of elegant density, Echo Park seems to get more "ugly urban" as this giant box rising on Cortez Street west of Glendale Boulevard show. The blob like building will serve as a sterile storage box for people and overwhelm the smaller Victorian-era homes now hidden from view. Nothing wrong with building apartments, and big buildings are not necessarily bad. But do they have to be this over bearing and sterile?
posted by Echo Park Historical Society at 1:17 PM
3 Comments:
I looked up this project -- I deduced the project you're talking about is at 1612-1620 Cortez. According to the permits, it is a 4-story, 21-unit, 100% affordable apartment building. It received a density bonus and reduced parking requirements because it is affordable. The architect is John Hayrapetian of Glendale. Apparently, Hayrapetian's son Allen, a UC Davis student, died in a motorcycle accident last November.
So here is a developer trying to build desperately needed affordable housing, his architect has gone through a tough ordeal, and you are critiquing the building because it doesn't meet your aesthetic tastes (based on what it looks like under construction)?
yes, i think he is. it looks crazy and a bit out of place with buildings around it. while afordable housing is needed , it could be more in tune with other buildings in the area.
it is depressing how ugly all of the new housing is which is going up in Historic Filipinotown. just take a look at what they built just this past year next to the Almond Oil Co(?) on the corner of Rockwood and Belmont. makes me want to cry.
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