Shawmut building 125,000 sq. ft. Mass Wood structure in LA for Redcar Properties

Santa Monica-based developer Redcar Properties, Portland, Ore.-based designer LEVER Architecture, and Boston-based general contractor Shawmut Design and Construction are working on what will be one of the tallest cross-laminated timber office/retail buildings in Los Angeles.

The 125,000-sq. ft. mixed-use building in the Chinatown district downtown, will be just under 75 ft. tall upon its scheduled delivery in August 2022, Building Design+Construction has reported.

The project broke ground last April and is about 30 percent completed. The installation of the CLT began last month.  The new structure is an adaptive reuse of a single-story retail mall that had been vacant for 30 years.

LEVER Architecture says on its website that the design splits the five-story building into two sections, with a tiered vertical garden courtyard between the office wings.

The building team worked with landscape architecture firm James Corner Field Operations to incorporate a series of outdoor terraces and decks, as well as open-air circulation elements, according to the website Urbanize Los Angeles.

Shawmut has previously completed a number of projects with CLT, says Greg Skalaski, executive vice-president-West in the contractor’s Los Angeles office. Structurlam, based in British Columbia, supplied the 5-ply CLT including 364 panels totalling 75,776 sq. ft.