LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Emerson College of Los Angeles will be awarded the prestigious Alliance for Quality Construction’s Q Award on June 24, 2014, for its construction of a flashy and technologically advanced LEED Gold Certified 10-story building. This $85 million, 107,000 square foot project began in early 2012 and was completed in the fourth quarter of 2013. The campus was union built by Hathaway Dinwiddie Construction Company, and architecturally designed by world-renowned architect Thom Mayne of Morphosis Architects.
Emerson College was established in 1880 and evolved from a small New England school of oratory to a multifaceted college with an international reputation. Situated in Boston, Massachusetts, Emerson College has offered a semester-long program in Los Angeles built around professional internships since 1986. In 2008, the college purchased a vacant lot in Hollywood to expand the Los Angeles program and a permanent home. The new campus offers students television, film, journalism, marketing, and communication internships, which assist in their networking base.
The construction team created a sun-shading system connected to a local weather station that automatically adjusts to minimize the energy used to heat, cool, and illuminate the glass-enclosed residential towers. A valence system, located within the ceilings, is controlled by sensors and provides radiant heating and cooling for the residential units. On top of the West tower, solar thermal panels use the sun to heat water, providing hot water throughout the center and decreasing the building’s consumption of natural gas. The building is also equipped with efficient fixtures and on-site water management to reduce water use by 40%.
“It is quite a remarkable feat for a structure of this magnitude and design to become LEED Gold Certified,” said AQC’s Chair Pam Ackrich. “Positive results can occur only with a stellar general contractor leading the project, superb architectural design, cooperation between government and Emerson College, and all union trades working in unison.”
The new Emerson College sustainable building is on the lively corner of Sunset Boulevard and Gordon Street, with a pristine view of the Hollywood sign. The glitzy building provides 6 general purpose classrooms, a computer lab, an audio lab, a distance learning room, two performance studios, dressing rooms, study rooms, a 4K screening room, a multi-purpose event space, and a post-audio mixing suite. The event space has advanced audio and visual equipment with seating capacity of 250 persons reconfigurable for special events and parties and the post audio is a 7.1 Dolby surround sound audio suite that is shaped to provide optimum acoustics. The outdoor terrace includes a park-like grass area with trees and barbeque grills.
AQC’s Q Award is given annually for outstanding contributions toward the attainment of quality construction within the building industry of Southern California. The recipient is selected by the Alliance’s membership from quality union construction projects completed in the previous year. Recipients of previous Q Awards have been the RedBuilding at the Pacific Design Center, Providence Holy Cross Medical Center, Los Angeles Unified School District’s Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools, the LAPD Police Administration Building, LAUSD Ramón C. Cortines School of the Visual and Performing Arts, Nokia Theatre at LA LIVE, Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Orange County, The Getty Villa in Malibu, The Home Depot Center in Dominguez Hills, The Walt Disney Concert Hall, and Our Lady of the Angels Cathedral.
Interested persons wishing to attend the Q Award presentation and luncheon should contact the Alliance for Quality Construction at 909-224-5749, or info@allianceqc.org.