It's been a long road, but our project at 888 Devon Avenue, on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, has received unanimous neighborhood Design Review Board (DRB) approval. We're pretty proud of the result, and we thought we'd share some more information about the process.

We were brought into the project early in 2014, after two unsuccessful preliminary DRB reviews, to help negotiate the project's unique (and small!) lot, the aesthetic demands of a project on such a famous street, and the delicate relationship to the adjacent National-Historic-Register-listed chateau.

The images below document the design's evolution. (click to enlarge.)

During this process, we revised the project heavily, relocating the driveway from Wilshire to the quieter Devon to mitigate traffic issues and noise, providing additional setbacks, reducing the number of units, reducing the number of parking levels (to two), decreasing the project height, adding two-story penthouse units, revising the materiality, and adding an accessible green roof and generous private terraces.

The process also gave us the chance to explore additional details that are normally explored later in the design process: irrigation and water management systems, lighting fixture selection, balcony details and a host of other small details of functionality and comfort.

We presented the final project design to the DRB again in early July, where we received an almost unheard-of unanimous verdict of unconditional approval. We also received the full support of the neighboring Chateau residents, having revised the project to ameliorate all of their concerns. The project is currently on its way through the next steps in the city's approval process, and we're excited to resume work on it soon. In the meantime, please head over to the project page here for more images and information on the project.

ARCHITECTS + URBANISTS

888 Devon DRB Approval