Solum Installation / Atelier Faber

Solum is a spatial and landscaped installation that draws attention to the importance of soil permeability in managing the water cycle.

Living by the beach has long been a defining aspiration—drawn by the promise of tempered nature, privacy, and immediate access to the water. Historically, beach houses tended to be rustic and pared back: partly because servicing remote sites and delivering materials was difficult, and partly because their charm lay in being closer to the elements—simpler, rougher, more direct.

In 2018, the City of Los Angeles made available some of its more than 1,700 city-owned parcels to affordable housing developers. Many of these sites are difficult, lying along heavy-traffic corridors or next to freeways. In other instances, the sites are composite parcels that have been left untouched for decades. In LOHA's second collaboration with non-profit developer Holos Communities, this 35,000-square-foot, 54-unit housing project and adjacent paseo repurpose a 19,814-square-foot triangular site, uniting a traffic island and a former railroad right-of-way. Situated near one of the world's busiest freeway interchanges—the meeting of the 110 and 105 freeways—the design makes a challenging location more livable.

As the nearby trees age, in no hurry, this scaleless piece will become even smaller. Cornered against a dark forest of Coihues (Nothofagus dombeyi), the concentrated and directionless footprint acquires an axial sense, explicitly asymmetrical, with one high side, perhaps completing an imaginary cube, and with its opposite side with no elevation at all.