L.A. Design Firm Wins Arena Contract

The NBBJ Sports & Entertainment architecture firm already has designed stadiums in Seattle and Cincinnati. Now, it has won the contract for a sports project only 10 blocks from its downtown Los Angeles headquarters--the proposed 20,000-seat sports arena at Figueroa and 11th streets.

“We want to create a new icon for downtown Los Angeles,” Dan Meis, NBBJ’s design principal, said Friday, shortly after the arena developers announced that the architecture firm had landed the contract.

In addition, PCL Construction Services, a Denver-based firm with regional offices in Glendale, was chosen as the general contractor to build the $200-million home for the Kings hockey and Lakers basketball teams. PCL’s local projects have included the downtown Citicorp Plaza and UCLA’s Anderson School of Management.

The Los Angeles City Council voted 11 to 3 last week in favor of a nonbinding financial plan for the arena, but final details of the agreement remain to be worked out and an environmental impact study must be done. The arena is backed by the Kings owners in a complicated deal that would also involve $70 million in public funds for land and other costs.

“We chose NBBJ and PCL because they have the vision to create a world-class sports and entertainment venue for the Los Angeles community,” John Semcken, an executive with the arena project, said in a prepared statement Friday.

Preliminary models show an arena bowl that rises 130 feet with a skin of metal and glass. Multistory extensions along the sidewalk would house restaurants, shops and offices. A fin-like tower, covered with video and neon signs, would mark the corner and entry to a pedestrian plaza.

The final plans will be closely scrutinized by downtown boosters and city leaders who say they want to ensure that the arena enlivens street life and fits well with the rest of the neighborhood. NBBJ says it wants a vibrant setting like New York’s Times Square.

“We definitely want it to be something very dynamic,” Meis said. “Sports and entertainment should be represented in the architecture, to make it look fast and moving, not static or heavy.” At the same time, he said, the new arena’s look should not clash with that of the adjacent Los Angeles Convention Center.

NBBJ’s selection was no surprise because the developers for months have been publicly showing the designs that NBBJ created in a effort to land the job. The design firm and PCL will be under pressure to work quickly so the arena can open by September 1999, replacing the Forum in Inglewood.