TCA Architects

2600 TELEGRAPH

tcaeditor - Jun 15, 2023

2600 Telegraph is an 8 story, all-electric apartment community in Oakland’s Arts District. This market-rate community contributes to the much-needed housing in Oakland. The project is a 5-level Type IIIA over 3-levels of Type IA podium. Resident amenities include a hospitality lobby, fitness center, co-working spaces, pet spa, club room, bike storage and repair station, and roof deck overlooking Oakland and San Francisco skyline. To maximize density the project is using two innovative technologies: a Cross Laminate Timber (CLT) floor assembly and Tandem Puzzle Lifts. The CLT floor assembly reduces the floor assembly thickness by 5” allowing the project to achieve 8 levels and stay under the Highrise code and allow a greater clear height in the units. The Tandem puzzle lifts turn 60 tandem parking spaces into 150 spaces that can be directly accessed. The project is targeting LEED Gold equivalency in line with Grosvenor’s ESG guideline.

Carmel Cadman Bellevue

tcaeditor - May 25, 2023

Bellevue Washington’s Bel-Red area is an emerging hub at the heart of the tech sector, with numerous tech companies, including Meta, establishing their headquarters there. Once an underutilized, low-scale industrial area, it now hosts several high-density buildings. At the center of Bel-Red is a 7.5-acre parcel adjacent to the Bel-Red Train Station. Our client envisioned a mixed-use, sustainable development incorporating 500,000 square feet of office space and 1,000 residential units. The site’s varying grades required the architecture, parking, and retail concepts to be tiered, offering a variety of views to the surrounding areas.

One of the significant challenges in the design process was the limited information provided beyond the potential program. TCA needed to establish a comprehensive understanding of the land, including base plans, utility locations, grading, and future transportation corridors. Extensive research was conducted to detail all available site influences that could affect the design. At TCA, we go beyond design; we aim to provide ourselves, and our clients a thorough understanding of the property.

Santa Ana Vision 100

tcaeditor - Apr 24, 2023

At the heart of Orange County lies the Civic Center in Santa Ana, surrounded by a rich and diverse history in downtown Santa Ana. Recent years have witnessed a remarkable rejuvenation of the area, marked by new infrastructure, development initiatives, and the ongoing construction of a train line connecting Garden Grove to the Santa Ana station. However, the Civic Center itself, with its mix of city, county, state, and federal properties, presents a unique challenge due to complex ownership arrangements. These convoluted property lines have posed a significant obstacle to cohesive design, resulting in a lack of unified vision for the center of the Civic Center.

Recognizing an opportunity to harmonize the various property interests and leverage underutilized land, the City of Santa Ana embarked on a mission to forge a unified design concept. TCA was entrusted with the task of delineating this vision within a tight three-week timeframe. The goal was to create compelling graphics and a video flythrough to present to the Santa Ana City Council in a private session.

In record time, TCA developed preliminary sketches outlining a master plan concept centered around a centralized plaza/park, serving as a focal point for all Civic Center uses. Integral to the plan was the construction of a new Santa Ana City Hall, necessitating the decommissioning of the existing facility, which had reached the end of its serviceable life. Through strategic restructuring of parking agreements and land allocation, new parcels would be unlocked for residential, hotel, and convention center developments.

This bold and vibrant concept has generated considerable momentum and sparked numerous discussions within the community, signaling a promising future for the Santa Ana Civic Center as a thriving hub of activity and innovation.

Click to watch the video fly through!

Harvest in Tracy

tcaeditor - Apr 22, 2023

Harvest in Tracy brings 304 two-story apartments across 86 buildings with a variety of styles, including, flat, carriage, and townhome. The site design is loaded with amenities including a resort-style pool with cabanas, top-of-the-line fitness center, bocce and basketball courts, a designer clubhouse, conference room and business center, community garden plots and edible community garden, and an on-site dog park and spa. TCA served as Architect of Record for the entitled project, previously designed by KTGY Architects.

HANOVER SEPULVEDA

tcaeditor - Apr 22, 2023

The concept for the design of Hanover Sepulveda is inspired by the natural topography of the site, dramatic and hidden from the bustling boulevard that defines busy Los Angeles city life. The long linear site translates into a project that is simple yet challenging at the same time. Site constraints and extreme topography posed challenges of access and building configuration. Special unit designs were employed to achieve high building efficiencies. Circulation and fire access requirements demanded the need for a concise arrival sequence, complete with a guest drop-off and turnaround area to meet current trends of transportation. The narrow street frontage allowed an opportunity to focus quality design on the limited front façade. The horizontal emphasis of lines and planes in the front elevation represent notions of stepped terraces, which define individual retreats for each dwelling unit. The ultimate oasis, in the form of a unique amenity deck, is tucked to the rear of the building, reserved for discovery by the residents. Natural material finishes, such as stone veneer and wood-toned siding, help to reinforce the ideas of capturing a sense of nature within the project.

ELEVEN 10

TCA Architect - Apr 15, 2023

Eleven 10 is a residential development on a 5.75-acre site in the city of Orange. The project is four stories of Type V residential over one-level of on-grade Type I parking structure, with one and one half levels of subterranean residential parking. By placing three large courtyards in strategic locations, the majority of the 260 units are provided with views into the active and passive courtyards. The Pool Courtyard opens toward the existing office tower’s public plaza and flanked by a 7,200 SF double-height fitness center and club room. The location of this largest courtyard and the residential amenities allows for greater interaction with the office tower, as well as activation of the plaza. The material palette consists of exterior plaster, cementitious siding, metal awnings, enhanced materials at key elements, and a contemporary color scheme.

ONYX

TCA Architect - Apr 15, 2023

Onyx blends traditional building façade design with contemporary colors, materials and an implied kinetic energy through playful fenestration patterns. Colorful glass guardrails reinforce this dynamism and are highlighted with architectural lighting. As an urban infill development, commercial spaces and residential entry lobbies connect the building to the public way, and employ large stone bases to help ground the building and reinforce these connections. A colorful, full-height-glazed building entry at the back of the entry court activates the formal entry, in addition to this South Park, Los Angeles street scene. Floor-to-ceiling storefront glazing at the top floor completes the top of the traditional building façade, and is articulated in contemporary mannerisms throughout. Design through entitlement, Kanner Architects; A.O.R, TCA Architects.

Millennium Mission Valley

TCA Architect - Apr 11, 2023

Millennium Mission Valley is a mixed-use apartment project on a 5.37 Acre site in San Diego, providing 291 residential and 14 shopkeeper units. Fundamental to the design is the connection of pedestrian access to and from the site. The design team held the building edge 20 feet back from the curb and carved out a 4,000 square-foot space for a central public plaza to provide a vibrant, pedestrian-oriented atmosphere. They located the project’s “front door” adjacent to a large public plaza to allow for a sense of arrival shared pedestrian experience. Courtyards offer multiple social areas to allow for a visual interaction with the central retail plaza. The retail awnings and storefronts along the ground level help to reduce the scale of the building along pedestrian frontages while allowing for views into public areas of the building. Architectural elements anchor key corners while punched openings and cantilevered balconies provide relief and texture; working to further break down the scale of the massing.

G12

TCA Architect - Apr 01, 2023

G12 reflects the rapidly transforming Los Angeles South Park neighborhood. The design was inspired by the neighborhood’s shift from commercial to mixed use. At the corner plaza, intersecting architectures reflect two of the area’s existing block building typologies. G12’s narrow facade mimics the exposed side of the neighborhood’s commercial buildings, with random patterns of various-sized windows. At the corner plaza, contrasting materials of grey aluminum panels and white cement panels reinforce the notion of intersecting architectures. This intersection also contributes to a reduction in scale consistent with the neighborhood. An atrium space links the second-floor courtyards with a hotel-like entry lobby, providing natural light and landscaping, which terraces down the volume into the first floor. A double-height, concrete-framed second floor accommodates mezzanine units with generous views towards the courtyards and outdoor amenity spaces. A top-floor sunning deck with a sculptural frame provides dramatic city views.