Searching for Context

Architects have a process. Part of my process is to familiarize myself with the surroundings of a project's site. As a transplant from Orange County, I felt it was important to familiarize myself with my loft's surroundings in the industrial part of Los Angeles. I wanted to get a feel for both the built and natural environment, so after some research, I figured that a run around nearby Elysian Park would give me an ideal perspective. I plotted a seven-mile course that would take me over the Los Angeles River to the park which occupies a hill and is also the home to Dodger Stadium. 

On the way to the  park I ran through a very industrial area that was bit intimidating to navigate by foot due to the lack of crosswalks and the ever present automobile traffic, but I soon started to notice a continuity to the overall look and feel of the place. The cars, bicycles, pedestrians, trucks, trains, all seemed to be choreographed. People driving waited patiently for pedestrians and bicycles and seemed much calmer than their Orange County counterparts. Large trucks would take up the whole intersection just to make a turn, but somehow they did so in such a fluid manner that it did not impede the flow of the congested streets.

Eventually I got to the park and was able to navigate over a dirt trail through a quirky mix of native plant species intermingled with palm trees to the top of the hill overlooking the river and the 5 freeway. I could now see the fabric of the city unfold itself in front of me as a dense, vibrant composition of old and new buildings teeming with activity.

The colors, massing and density of the city are going to inform my selection of colors and materials for the interior of the loft. I want the loft to relate to its industrial environment and feel like it meshes with the local character. The New Urbanist in me won't let me forget that architecture should mean something, and to do so, it should take cues from the local vernacular, cultural history, natural environment, and local climate. I believe people want to relate to their built environment, take ownership of it, and feel like they belong in a community. They do not want feel isolated in buildings that they can not relate to or that disconnect them from their surroundings.  

The imagery I see on these runs through the city will be stored in my mental database and have a big influence on the way I design not only the loft, but all the architecture projects that I will be doing in Los Angeles.                      

Demolition Time

There's an unnecessary wall forming a broom closet in the loft entry area that we want to remove. It is dark, cramped and takes up space so it has to go. It's constructed of light gauge steel framing covered with drywall on one side.


As an architect, I am always focusing on building things. But it's a nice change of pace to reverse the process. When I first became involved in construction 25 years ago I always looked forward to tearing things down, but the process of smashing things was not only messy and dangerous, it created a huge amount of waste that had to go to the landfill. I soon learned how to dismantle instead of destroy. I still was able to bring walls down, but by utilizing a "sane" approach of systematically dismantling construction assemblies, I not only did the same amount of work in the same amount of time (due to less clean-up), I was able to harvest materials that could be re-purposed for other projects. I plan on building new walls in the loft and, since we want to save as much money as possible, the unused closet should yield a fair amount of reusable material.


The drywall is connected to the framing with self-tapping screws. It is nearly impossible to locate the screws on the finished surface to back them out with a screwdriver, so I will use a different technique. By cutting the drywall with a utility knife along one end of the wall and and knocking out a small hole for a hand-hold with a hammer, I am able to pull the drywall away from the studs. The screws stay attached to the studs, leaving small holes on the back of the drywall. This does disfigure the back of the panel, but leaves the face relatively unblemished. 

   

Once the drywall is removed, the "zippies," - small self-tapping screws that hold the metal frame together - are backed out with a screw gun. After the whole assembly is dismantled, I unscrew the drywall screws from the studs.


From start to finish, it took 4 hours to remove the wall, strip the materials into component parts, and clean up. In the end, I have about 4 sheets of gypsum board, 16: 10' steel studs and tracks, and about a pound and a half of drywall and zippy screws I can reuse to build a new wall somewhere else in the loft. I also harvested 5 junction boxes, 20 feet of flexible metal conduit, assorted light switches, wire, electrical outlets and a PA speaker with a spider living inside. The waste was minimal. 

The estimated value of comparable new materials - $200. And I don't have to make a trip to the hardware store when I build a wall later.

Temporary Solution - Walk-In Closet

Need a quick closet? Have big pipes running through your loft? Check the pipe strength first - ours were cast iron supported by pipe hangers designed for the plumbing of an industrial building. They are designed to carry a much greater load than our clothes. So, we took old galvanized pipe we'd been hanging onto, cut it into clothes pole length using a disc grinder with a carborundum blade (safety glasses absolutely required), and suspended them from the loft pipes using chains. For shelving, we bought 2 suspension rails, 10 steel brackets, and 5 shelves from a local store. Now we have a decent walk-in closet that will suffice until we build something better and we only had to make 4 screw holes in the wall. We can always re-use the shelving system for other needs and in other configurations. 

Final Stats

Cost:  Shelving System = $120

          Chain = 8 feet for $5

          Pipe = Reused $0
Difficulty: Easy (Moderate if you have to cut pipe and chain)

Things You'll Notice When You Move Into Your Loft

No Storage

The first thing you'll notice, which you may not have truly noticed when you first saw the loft, is the lack of built-in storage. Be prepared to live out of boxes for a while, rooting around for your pants and stacking the important things you find into piles. If you brought the "this might come in handy one day" junk from your old house, it will be part of the decor until you build something to put it in or finally put it by the dumpster for a neighbor to take. If you had notions that you'd be unpacked in a week and your friends could come over to check out your cool new pad, you thought wrong.

No Walls

Aside from the walls separating your loft from the neighbors and the walls around the bathroom, there may not be any other walls. So your dining room, living room, bedroom and kitchen are one big space until you make separation walls. Think of it as "the great room." 

No Kitchen
If you like to cook, you'll notice there is nothing that qualifies as a kitchen. It's up to you to install what you need to store your food and cook it on. And if your loft doesn't come with an oven, you'll go without one until you buy it and install the 220 line to the area you designate as your kitchen. Until then, it's portable burners, the toaster oven and a microwave. On a table. Connected to a power strip with a big reset button for when the circuit breaks.

Noises

Industrial buildings are echoey and make clanking sounds. The artiste next to you may have a rolling cart of paints he rolls around the room. You can hear it. The girl above you may dance for a living and her high heels tap all the way across the ceiling when she comes home at night. The pipes that drain everyone's bathwater run right through your living space. When water rushes through them, you can hear it. But these aren't unpleasant sounds -- they make the building feel alive. And you're in its belly.

Moving into an Industrial Loft

I'm an architect setting up an architecture practice in an industrial loft in downtown Los Angeles. My wife is brave enough to join me in this venture wherein we attempt to transform a raw, empty space into not only a business but also a place we can call home. The major advantage to living in a work/live loft is that the work commute is only 15 steps. The disadvantage is it requires effort to separate the 'working' zone from the 'living' zone in order to maintain privacy. The goal is to create an space conducive to a professional office environment where we feel comfortable and happy living. This blog will document our attempt to create a comfortable, habitable work and live space. For every problem encountered there should be a solution, and this blog aims to provide solutions both cheap and spendy, easy and hard.


The reason we chose a loft was because we felt we could only live in LA if we didn't have to battle the freeways every day commuting to work, so we decided to combine our work and live spaces. A loft makes sense for not only logistical reasons, but financial reasons. Setting up an architectural practice in this economy means making every penny count. We start with a fixed budget of $50,000.00 for rent, utilities and improvements. Let's see where that gets us.