Tall & Urban News

Hayden Tract, a former manufacturing hub in Culver City, California has been undergoing a transformation over the past four decades with buildings ideated by tech firms. The (W)rapper, which is a recently completed 16-story, 241-foot-tall (73.6-meter-tall) high-rise by Eric Owen Moss Architects, was actually approved over 20 years ago in 2001.  It has been interrupted by various factors during the process including the 2008 recession. Inspired by an art installation called "Dancing Bleachers," the building's column/beam grid is based on curving external bands, contributing to its unconventional look with complex geometries. 

The building is bearing on (20) triple pendulum base isolaters making it one of the only base isolated high-rise office buildings in the United States and ensuring it to be one of the safest, and most resilient, high-rise buildings currently built in this region. The floors are supported on an arching structural steel box section exoskeleton allowing for a column-free interior with varying floor-to-floor heights throughout the space and a fully offset core, leaving interior spaces across the floor plates spacious and open for flexible use. It features a tinted and gridded window wall system, and arching structural steel bands on the exterior.

The described structure makes the building highly earthquake resistant, an important consideration for its location within a seismic area.

For more on this story, go to Metropolis Mag.