The Responsive City: A Flexible, Inclusive, And Evolving Community Center For The City Of Los Angeles | Architecture Thesis

Site Context

The site spans 300,000 square feet in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, positioned adjacent to Jordan High School and bordered by both residential and mixed-use developments. Watts is a community with a rich history, shaped by cultural diversity and resilience. Despite facing ongoing challenges, it remains a place of strong identity and civic pride. Designing a community center in this context means developing a space that authentically represents and supports the needs and spirit of the people who shape this neighborhood.

Design Process

Three precedent projects grounded in mat typology were analyzed, offering valuable lessons in spatial adaptability, organic growth, and long-term resilience. To apply these concepts, the students conducted figure-ground studies that extracted key characteristics—such as top-down planning, bottom-up growth, and meandering qualities—from each case. These spatial strategies were then tailored to the specific context and boundaries of Watts, allowing them to evolve in a way that felt authentic to the site.

Through collage-based design explorations, the team developed a series of layered components—like plug-ins—each contributing a unique strategy.

The Grand Bazaar: Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar served as a model of a “city within a city,” defined by its dense, interconnected network of wide and narrow passageways. This self-contained urban fabric inspired a grid-based system that structured circulation, roof design, and landscape elements—effectively embedding a new micro-city into the Watts neighborhood. The team also drew from its role as a bustling marketplace, aligning with their vision of the community center as a daily hub for both social and economic activity.

The Venice Hospital: Le Corbusier’s unbuilt Venice Hospital proposed a modular system that could grow organically over time—an idea that informed an approach to flexible massing. This bottom-up strategy enabled the design to remain adaptable, responding to changing community needs rather than remaining static.

The Okurayama Apartments: Located in Yokohama, Japan, the Okurayama Apartments introduced a looser, more fluid form of circulation. With winding paths that blur the lines between inside and outside, this project helped soften the rigidity of our other precedents. It brought a more organic and human-centered spatial experience to the design, encouraging exploration and informal use.

Final Outcome

The design plans demonstrate how a layered spatial strategy creates a decentralized network of adaptable spaces. Rather than concentrating activity in a single hub, the program is dispersed across the site, fostering engagement at various scales.

At ground level, operable walls allow interior spaces to fully open to the outside, dissolving the boundary between indoor and outdoor environments. This openness enhances the center’s adaptability and transforms it into an open-air civic space, inviting nature in and expanding public life beyond the building itself.

Anchoring the design is the Grand Canopy, a continuous roof structure that unifies the scattered buildings across the site. It supports various adaptive systems—including passive cooling features for heat mitigation, partition panels for spatial flexibility, and integrated lighting and structural components that enable second-level connections.

A primary function of the canopy is to preserve open space on the ground floor, ensuring that the center can accommodate large gatherings during emergencies. By lifting essential systems overhead, the ground plane remains open and fluid. Additionally, the canopy provides shade and comfort, while its perforated design brings in natural light and improves environmental performance beneath.

The program is intentionally designed to function across a range of scenarios, from everyday community use to emergency response. At the center of the site, a market plaza encourages daily interaction and supports local economies. In times of crisis, it can quickly transform into a communal kitchen and dining area, offering essential services and restoring a sense of stability. As recovery unfolds, the space remains familiar and welcoming, reinforcing social cohesion and emotional well-being.

Other key spaces—such as classrooms, sports facilities, and an arts center—serve as educational and cultural anchors in everyday life. Post-disaster, these same areas transition into wellness and healing zones, providing space for physical activity, creative expression, and emotional recovery—critical tools for long-term resilience.

Conclusion: The design addresses the diverse and shifting needs of community life by seamlessly integrating both social and physical elements. It offers a space that is adaptable, inclusive, and continually responsive—more than just a building, it is a dynamic framework shaped by and for the people it serves.

[This Academic Project has been published with text and images submitted by the student]