Deft hands carefully steadied cans of tuna, baked beans and chicken inside Anaheim’s large transit station.
The collection of preserved food slowly took shape into a regal lion rising more than seven feet tall.
The public art piece and four other colossal canned food structures crafted by local architecture and engineering firms will be displayed through Sept. 27 at the Anaheim Regional Transportation Intermodal Center as part of an effort to feed the poor.
View the original article from Orange County Register
Students and faculty at Newcomb Academy in Long Beach will return to class Wednesday to a renovated campus with new features.
Newcomb Academy is the first K-8 school rebuilt as part of the Long Beach Unified School District’s Measure K bond program. The bond program has already created three new schools aside from significant infrastructure updates at different schools sites within the district.
View the original article from the Press Telegram
“I am thrilled and relieved that the State Allocation Board has provided facility hardship approvals under the Seismic Mitigation Program for La Quinta and Pacifica High Schools,” said Margaret Brown, Garden Grove USD’s Director of Facilities. “The State’s multi agency process for approving the plans and specifications is both demanding and complex. We need the best consultants working collaboratively to get the design right while meeting strict deadlines. Westgroup Designs led the team and was able to build consensus for a new design. These rebuilt schools will serve students and staff, as well as parents and the community, for decades to come.”
As part of Garden Grove USD’s facilities improvement efforts, Westgroup fast-track designed a total of 18 new buildings and six modernized existing buildings at La Quinta and Pacifica High Schools in order to meet the bi-annual deadline to secure AB 300 funds. In addition, the projects’ designs are strategically phased in construction as to not interrupt the day-to-day education activities of each campus.
In addition to their work with Garden Grove USD, Westgroup Designs is currently finishing construction of the $42 million Newcomb Academy from Long Beach USD that utilized $18 million of AB 300 funds.
Keys to the Success in Securing and Maximizing AB 300 Funds
1. DSA/OPSC Approvals – Successful approvals hinge on three core elements: trust relations, technical knowledge and funding knowledge. An architecture firm must have deep familiarity with government agencies, and a combination of both technical and funding knowledge enables the firm to effectively strategize the design process in order to maximize funding. With these three strengths, Westgroup’s in-house experts were able to negotiate with OPSC about funding concerns and strategically calculate the funds in accordance with the design.
2. Creative Design Solutions – Complex projects in need of fresh and modernized design elements must undergo strategic planning so as to expedite agency approvals. In order to fully aid Garden Grove USD, Westgroup created solutions that honed in on cost efficient design—not simplified design—in order to maximize the space of the campuses with the funding at hand.
3. Timing – Time is money, and transferring students to a different school or renting interim classrooms while facilities undergo construction is expensive and disruptive for educational delivery. Westgroup’s solution concentrated on a strategic, fast-track and complex phasing to rid the need of interim housing altogether, thereby allowing for day-to-day classroom activities to continue undisturbed.
John is bringing additional senior leadership power to the team!
John is joining WD with over 30 years of experience in planning, design, project management and business development. His inclusive, interdisciplinary approach has resulted in projects notable for their contextual sensitivity, programmatic responsiveness, economy, commitment to sustainability and award-winning design quality. In his spare time, he and his wife enjoy traveling, attending music concerts and sipping on wine.
Renee is on board to trim our sails to the wind!
Renee brings a holistic approach to strategy with experience in marketing, brand communications, business development, team leadership and organizational and talent management. She loves unlocking vision, creating direction and providing structure, and then seeing creative teams reap the benefits. Outside of work, Renee is dedicated to her husband and 4-year old daughter, “mini me.” Her bucket list includes visiting Angkor Wat, collaborating with Tony Robbins and space tourism.
Rilla is helping us up the ante in marketing and brand communications!
Rilla is a recent graduate from University of California, Santa Barbara with experience in marketing, social media, public relations and graphic design. She holds an incorrigible passion for creation, whether this means painting images on a canvas or computer screen, illustrating concepts through words or animating ideas via speech and sound. When she isn’t working, Rilla spends time with her family, blasts Electronic Dance Music (EDM), visits new eateries and stares into an abyss of corgi photos.
Organizations across the county entered into the two-part evaluation process. The first consisted of evaluating each employer’s workplace policies, practices and demographics worth 25% of the total evaluation. The second part consisted of an employee survey designed to measure the employee experience which was 75% of the total evaluation. Best Companies Group managed the overall registration and survey process and then analyzed the data to determine who the top companies were. The final ranking of the winning organizations will be released via a special section of the OCBJ’s July 27th issue.
http://www.bestplacestoworkoc.com/
A new creative office building becomes the first speculative office building in Southern California to achieve LEED for Core and Shell Platinum certification.
IN 2012, WESTGROUP Designs had the opportunity to create a new office building for Google at Impac Center in Irvine, California. The existing campus was a collection of office buildings and a freestanding restaurant set around a vehicular approach, which resulted in awkward geometries, limited pedestrian interaction and underutilized spaces
View the original article from Development Magazine