Top O.C. Design Awards Go to LPA Inc., Ralph Allen & Partners : Architecture: Local AIA chapter honors the firms for outstanding work in their concepts for a headquarters building and a public school.

LPA Inc. of Irvine and Ralph Allen & Partners of Santa Ana took top honors Friday night at the annual Design Awards sponsored by the American Institute of Architects’ Orange County chapter.

A jury of three visiting design professionals chose 12 of the 64 entries for commendation.

Allen & Partners won one of the two top Honor awards for the Mary Butler Intermediate School in the Long Beach Unified School District. LPA received the other Honor award for the Kubota Tractor Corp. headquarters in Compton.

The jurors said the school design was selected for its clear plan, “natural ventilation” and “honest use of concrete.” The Kubota building was cited for integrating natural landscape and Japanese cultural artifacts.

LPA also won a Merit award for a planned school in Santa Ana, described by one juror as “the best of the unbuilt works.”

The other two Merit awards went to McLarand, Vasquez & Partners of Costa Mesa for a luxury production home (Residence 4 of the Palo Brea at Bighorn project) in Palm Desert--praised for its “restrained commitment to the use of desert forms and colors”--and to Mark J. Paone, AIA, of Orange, for the Regional Burn Center at the UC San Diego Medical Center in San Diego. The jury admired the way that project “took the mundane function of medical operation and turned it into a series of exciting spaces.”

Of the seven Honorable Mention awards, four were bestowed for completed projects. Wimberly Allison Tong & Goo of Newport Beach was recognized for its design of the Broken Top Gold Clubhouse in Bend, Ore. Secoy/Kosco Architects of Orange was cited for the restoration of the principals’ residence in Orange. Robbins Jorgensen Christopher of Irvine was honored for the design of the Otay Mesa Fire Station in San Diego, and Mark H. Singer & Associates of Laguna Beach for the Latter residence in Laguna Beach.

The other three Honorable Mentions went to as yet unrealized (“on the boards”) designs.

LPA picked up its third prize of the evening for the chapel at Lake Hills Community Church in Laguna Hills. Paul Zajfen Architect and the IBI Group of Irvine won for Zajfen’s planned residence in Laguna Beach, and the Blurock Partnership of Newport Beach was cited for the Student Services/Campus Center at the College of the Sequoias in Visalia.

The jurors were Paul Holt, AIA, of Holt Hinshaw Architects, San Francisco; Pierre Koenig, FAIA, of Los Angeles; and Daniel Dworsky, FAIA, of Dworsky Associates, Los Angeles.