LA’s transition from one-industry town to arts-to-tech creative hub is attracting an influx of hubs-within-hubs. And London-based operations are leading the charge. Not surprisingly Soho House already has two LA outposts with another in the works for downtown. Spring Place opened in Beverly Hills last year and is also planning an opening downtown. Co-working operation Second Home, which now runs four sites in London after recent openings in Clerkenwell and London Fields, arrives in LA this September.
Second Home has chosen still sketchy East Hollywood as its entry point with architects SelgasCano on design duties – the team behind three London locations and the Lisbon location. The architects are transforming the historic Anne Banning Community House. And as a teaser Second Home has shipped out and installed the Madrid-based practice’s 2015 Serpentine Pavillion at La Brea Tar Pits.
Over the next six months the pavilion – 866 sq ft of interlocking organic chambers and tunnels in translucent coloured fabric – will host a programme of art, music and talks including events with filmmaker David Lynch, Netflix and the World Wildlife Fund, and charities such as the American Youth Symphony and Inner City Arts. The installation is a collaboration with the National History Museums of Los Angeles County (NHMLAC) – La Brea Tar Pits is the only active urban Ice Age excavation site in the world and saber-toothed cats, giant sloths, dire wolves, mammoths, and mastodons have all been found on the site and displayed at George C. Page Museum.
RELATED STORY
Sam Aldenton, who co-founded Second Home with Rohan Silva in 2014 (see our interview in W*229), says the pair have fallen in love with the ‘contradictions, sub-cultures and people’ of the city and call the installation their ‘Love letter to LA’.
When it opens, Second Home LA will include 90,000 sq ft of co-working space, as well as a 200-seat event space, recording studio, restaurant and a branch of the Libreria bookshop. Second Home’s sites are more porous than most co-working operations and members clubs and the events space and restaurant will be open to the public and local charities and neighbourhood groups will be able to use meeting rooms for free.
The campus-style development is made up of 60 single-storey oval-shaped studios wrapped in translucent acrylic with ‘lily-pad’ like roofs, all set in a lush new garden and designed to house 250 organisations.
NHMLAC meanwhile recently announced plans to ‘re-imagine and renovate’ its 12-acre campus in Hancock Park, which includes La Brea Tar Pits and the George C. Page Museum. A competition to develop a masterplan for the site is down to three practices, including Diller, Scofidio + Renfro.
INFORMATION
ADDRESS
La Brea Tar Pits
5801 Wilshire Blvd
Los Angeles
CA 90036
US
-
What is the role of fragrance in contemporary culture, asks a new exhibition at 10 Corso ComoMilan concept store 10 Corso Como has partnered with London creative agency System Preferences to launch Olfactory Projections 01
-
Jack White's Third Man Records opens a Paris pop-upJack White's immaculately-branded record store will set up shop in the 9th arrondissement this weekend
-
Designer Marta de la Rica’s elegant Madrid studio is full of perfectly-pitched contradictionsThe studio, or ‘the laboratory’ as de la Rica and her team call it, plays with colour, texture and scale in eminently rewarding ways
-
This Rocky Mountains house is a ski-lover's dream escapeBozeman, a Rocky Mountains house by Pearson Design Group and Frederick Tang Architecture, is a contemporary retreat that sits low in its natural, Montana setting
-
Take a deep dive into The Palm Springs School ahead of the region’s Modernism WeekNew book ‘The Palm Springs School: Desert Modernism 1934-1975’ is the ultimate guide to exploring the midcentury gems of California, during Palm Springs Modernism Week 2025 and beyond
-
A wavy roof tops this sophisticated take on a backyard cabin in CaliforniaThis Californian Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) by Spiegel Aihara Workshop (SAW), offers an aesthetic and functional answer to housing shortages and multigenerational family living
-
Palm Springs Modernism Week 2025: let the desert architecture party beginPalm Springs Modernism Week 2025 launches on 13 February, marking the popular annual desert event’s 20th anniversary, celebrated this year through more midcentury marvels than ever
-
On the shores of Discovery Bay, this wooden house is the ultimate waterside retreatDekleva Gregorič’s Discovery Bay House is a structured yet organic shelter that blends perfectly into the surrounding Pacific Northwest landscape
-
The 10 emerging American Midwest architects you need to knowWe profile 10 emerging American Midwest architects shaking up the world of architecture - in their territory, and beyond
-
A light-filled New York loft renovation magics up extra space in a deceptively sized homeThis New York loft renovation by local practice BOND is now a warm and welcoming apartment that feels more spacious than it actually is
-
Inside Bell Labs, the modernist vision behind Severance's minimalist settingWe explore the history of Bell Labs - now known as Bell Works - the modernist Eero Saarinen-designed facility in New Jersey, which inspired the dystopian minimalist setting of 'Severance'
