Urban Scene : Neighborhood-Friendly Designs : Architecture: State AIA gives awards to 17 new projects and renovations. Los Angeles firms won most accolades.

Imogen Apartments, a low-income rental development designed to reduce its impact on the neighboring single-family houses in the Silver Lake district of Los Angeles, was honored with two awards by the California Council, American Institute of Architects.

New projects like Imogen Apartments, along with renovations of significant buildings and buildings that are architectural achievements, were among the 17 winners honored by the California Council of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Imogen architects Bruce Sternberg & Associates of Los Angeles divided the building into six triplex and duplex units, winning a Merit Award, the AIA’s second highest, and a People in Architecture Award, recognizing projects that “provide an outstanding response to user needs.”

The 17 included seven Honor Awards, the institute’s highest honor, nine Merit Awards and two special awards. Members of the Los Angeles chapter won the most awards, three Honor Awards, three Merit Awards and a special award.

The winners were chosen from among 272 entries by a jury of three out-of-state architects: Sarah Harkness of the Architects Collaborative, Boston; Margaret McCurry of Tigerman McCurry, Chicago, and James Stewart Polshek of James Stewart Polshek and Partners, New York.

Honor Awards to members of the L.A. chapter went to two projects of Frank O. Gehry & Associates Inc., Santa Monica: The Edgemar Commercial Development and Art Museum on Santa Monica’s Main Street and the offices of the advertising firm of Chiat/Day/Mojo in Toronto.

The other Los Angeles chapter Honor Award went to Morphosis Architects, Santa Monica, for the Leon Max Los Angeles Showroom, in the downtown garment district. The jury called the showroom “architecture as a high form of art.”

The other Merit Awards to members of the L.A. chapter went to Steven Ehrlich AIA Architects, Venice, for Windward Circle Redevelopment, a Venice project that consists of three mixed-use buildings that revitalize a 1920s central square, and Goldman/Firth/Architects, Malibu, for the Seaview Terraces office complex in Malibu, which cascades down a hillside overlooking the ocean.

The firm of LPA (formerly called Leason Pomeroy Associates), Orange, received the 1990 Firm Award for consistently producing distinguished architecture for a period of 10 years or more. LPA also has offices in Los Angeles, Sacramento and San Diego.

The Marin County Civic Center in San Rafael, Frank Lloyd Wright’s last major design commission and the only public facility Wright designed, received the 25-year Award for distinguished architecture of enduring significance.

Other California architects receiving Honor Awards, and their projects:

Daniel Solomon & John Goldman Associated Architects, San Francisco, for Beideman Place Townhouses, San Francisco; Delawie/Bretton/Wilkes Associates AIA, San Diego, the Mills Building/MTS Headquarters, San Diego; LPA, Sacramento, the Thornhill Residence, Davis, and Fernau & Hartman Architects, Berkeley, for the Berggruen House in Napa County.

Merit Awards outside the Los Angeles AIA chapter went to: Hall Goodhue Haisley and Barker, San Francisco, for Cannery Row Garage, Monterey; Edwin S. Darden Associates Inc., Fresno, for Coalinga Community Swim Complex, Coalinga; Banta Collins, Emeryville, for Hollis Street Project, Emeryville; Dreyfuss & Blackford Architects, Sacramento, for Lincoln Plaza, Sacramento; Robert Herman Associates Inc., San Francisco, the Mendelsohn House, San Francisco. The Mendelsohn House also received a People in Architecture Award.