Basheer Hejal

Unboxing the Unseen In-Between

Given the protracted timelines inherent in the construction of permanent structures within Los Angeles, how might we address the city’s immediate and evolving programmatic demands? Could we envision mobile interventions capable of seamlessly integrating into the existing urban tapestry? Inhabiting abandoned buildings and their adjacent void spaces while challenging air rights?

This thesis investigates the “unseen” sites, categorized as air right properties in downtown LA. The thesis critically examines design techniques of unboxing and unfolding as an applicable design methodology to occupy underutilized spaces in DTLA. It explores co-working, temporary living, and re-living as programmatic possibilities to an ongoing inhabitation crisis in the city through unboxing the unseen, in-between.

Upon extensive research on the building code in Los Angeles and Downtown specifically, the project looks to challenge adjacency via formal explorations of envelope: the relationship between set-back and opening, exchanging air rights, sharing egress, temporary vs permanent.

Programmatically, the project finds complimentary in the temporary: using a permanent structure that hosts temporary spaces in response to the demand of the adjacent buildings and subsequently downtown.

The project is a systematic proposal of inhabiting urban voids and abandoned buildings. By setting a precedent, the idea is to develop a contagious system of utilizing these abandoned buildings and their adjacent unseen spaces.