Cuningham Designs New Culver City Home, Neighbors Remain On Alert

Globe Street reports that Cuningham Group Architecture, a Minneapolis-based architecture firm with an office in Marina Del Rey, and the same firm that designed Elements Lofts and Hollywood's Madrone, is behind a new office space at 8665 Hayden Place in Culver City, a project the firm will move into once it's completed. A proposal that riled some neighbors in the surrounding community last year, the development was eventually granted entitlements in early 2009. Still, many of the signs remain up on lawns in Culver City (at least they were still up as of September 2009). Additionally, the official web site fighting the project (that's an October 2008 meeting referenced) remains up. Why are neighbors leaving the signs on their lawns? Greg Reitz, principal at REthink Development Corp, which is developing the project with Cuningham (REthink is the same firm behind Hollywood's Cherokee Lofts), says he's not sure, but he believes it's a warning sign to other developers who may want to come in to the Hayden Tract-area neighborhood.

Meanwhile, Globe Street names a ground-breaking of 2011, but Reitz says everything is contingent on the markets. And he sends a bit more info about the project via email: "The building will consist of for-sale creative office commercial condominiums. The unit sizes will range from 1700 to 3500 square feet with one large 6400 square foot penthouse commercial unit. The 63,000 gross square foot building can be subdivided into a maximum of 18 units but multiple units can be combined for a single tenant. We are aiming to achieve a LEED Platinum rating and to produce one of the greenest commercial office buildings in the US. If the economy allows, construction will begin April 2010 with completion to follow closely on the heels of the completion of the Expo Line light rail that terminates just over quarter of a mile from the property."

It's expected that ReThink/Cuningham will sell the commercial units (notwithstanding the ones that they move into).

· Architect Turns Developer in $24M LEED Project [Globe Street]