Barrington1503

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Barrington1503 reshapes how thoughtful design enhances community spaces while providing much-needed density with 18 units and 79 bedrooms. By redefining traditional modes of housing, the project fosters community building, prioritizes healthy living environments, and contributes to making Los Angeles a more hospitable place to live. At the heart of Barrington1503’s design is the concept of a spatial social gradient. Passing beneath the building’s distinct mural, residents move through a shared courtyard and ascend via pathways guiding them upward. These pathways are more than circulation—they are spaces of connection, allowing for chance encounters and fostering an organic sense of community. Each of the four distinct volumes contains communal dining and living spaces, offering semi-private areas that transition into fully private bedrooms. In contrast to the expansive sliding windows and doors of the shared living rooms, which open inward toward the courtyard, bedroom windows face outward, framing individual views of the surrounding city. This dual orientation enhances both privacy and connection, engaging the broader urban landscape while maintaining a strong internal community. Barrington1503 creates a layered transition between public and private realms. This approach ensures that personal spaces remain protected while benefiting from shared living. The project addresses the complexities of communal housing, supporting both interaction and solitude. By prioritizing vibrant communal areas, outdoor access, and sheltered private spaces, Barrington1503 realizes coliving as a viable and compelling urban housing model.
//jury comments

This project introduces density while carving volumes to allow for light, air, openness and community gathering. The layering and orientation of private social spaces with public ones is particularly compelling. The courtyard core community zone does so much to create place and porosity, units have individual identities but are interconnected. The shared living room concept, these are not traditional units, is very strong. The floor plan works very well.

//framework for design excellence measures
Measure 1: Design for Integration
The success of coliving depends on skillfully balancing shared community spaces with well-defined private areas. At the heart of Barrington1503’s design is the concept of a spatial social gradient. Without intentional execution—one that prioritizes vibrant communal areas, effortless access to the outdoors, and thoughtfully sheltered private spaces—coliving cannot succeed as an alternative housing model. Barrington1503 not only embraces the promise of coliving but brings it to life with architectural precision, creating a model for 21st-century urban housing that is as functional as it is inspiring.
Measure 2: Design for Equitable Communities
Design for Barrington1503 considered the needs of students and graduate students who need housing near UCLA and who might want to balance aspects of community as well as independence in their housing experience. We have previous experience working with similar housing projects in this neighborhood specifically aimed for students, and were able to consider those insights
Measure 3: Design for Ecosystems
Barrington1503 provides planted roof area and courtyard with pollinators and drought-tolerant plant life.
Measure 4: Design for Water
Extensive stormwater and rainwater capture and reuse system with planters, permavoid system which doubles as landscape feature
Measure 5: Design for Economy
Barrington1503 is a coliving project that aims to bring density to this West LA neighborhood.
Measure 6: Design for Energy
Barrington1503 implements passive survivability strategies to reduce need for AC and artificial lighting; large sliding glass doors open out to the cool, shaded courtyard to increase airflow into communal living areas, and operable windows in bedrooms provide additional opportunities for cross-ventilation and natural light.
Measure 7: Design for Well-Being
Barrington1503’s operable sliding doors face toward the shady, cool courtyard, allowing direct access to airflow into communal areas, and the bedrooms receive solar exposure and light from outward orientation. The light color scheme of the courtyard also diffuses soft natural light into the units, so electric lighting can remain off during the day. Units implement a green paint palette that help to define active areas from restful ones. Access points to outoors are plentiful and scattered throughout the project as opposed to one localized spot on-site; Roof is heavily-programmed with bbq, firepits and seating.
Measure 8: Design for Resources
The density provided by coliving design inherently reduces required material and embodied carbon.
Measure 9: Design for Change
Barrington1503 was designed with flexibility in mind. Although this has been launched as a coliving project, groups or families can make changes to units as-needed. Additionally, this project began during the height of Covid and was designed around the idea of providing opportunities for safe outdoor social gatherings, rethinking safety of community spaces.
Measure 10: Design for Discovery
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