After nearly 15 years of being closed to the public, Bicentennial Park will soon provide a lively setting for neighborhood recreation. The City of Hawthorne has been home to many creative people throughout history: a legendary athlete and Olympian, Jim Thorpe; a world-famous movie star, Marilyn Monroe; and one of the most beloved American rock bands, The Beach Boys. The City is also at the center of the United States aerospace industry, home to Northrop Grumman and SpaceX. Hawthorne High School provides outstanding programs in engineering and manufacturing, promising a future generation of leading scientists. Yet today, more than 20 percent of the total population of Hawthorne lives below the poverty line and the community is victim to some of the worst environmental conditions in Southern California. In collaboration with The Trust for Public Land, the local community has worked for many years to redevelop the little-used and neglected Bicentennial Park property into a safe, welcoming recreational resource for city residents. Working closely with project stakeholders, SWA designers have developed a design for the park renovation inspired by Hawthorne s history and heritage. Focusing on the playground as a main feature of the park, SWA proposed the concept “Where Creative Minds Grow.” The park’s design concept features the history of aviation as a playful element, exposing generations young and old to the community’s unique history.
Hunter's Point South Waterfront Park
Hunter’s Point South Waterfront Park was envisioned as an international model of urban ecology and a world laboratory for innovative sustainable thinking. The project is a collaboration between Thomas Balsley Associates and WEISS/MANFREDI for the open space and park design with ARUP as the prime consultant and infrastructure designer.
What was once a ba...
Lin'an High Tech Park
Lin’an Qingshan Lake Forest Technology Park offers a premier destination for high-tech and green-tech businesses. Designed in harmony with nature, this mixed-use community will foster productivity and connections to its physical and cultural setting, providing a vibrant mix of uses and a business culture appealing to a wide range of international enterprises. ...
Main Street Garden Park
A key component in the downtown revitalization strategy, Main Street Garden Park required razing two city blocks of buildings and garages to make way for its transformation into a vibrant public space teeming with civic life. This two-acre park fosters downtown residential and commercial growth and was designed to accommodate the needs of residents in adjacent...
Resonant Memory: One October Memorial
Inspired by the shared love of country music that brought people from all over the world together for the Route 91 Music Festival, Resonant Memory is based on the shape of an acoustic guitar. The design makes particular use of the instrument’s sound hole as a recurring motif to represent absence, honoring the lives lost on October 1, 2017, in Las Vegas, Nevada...