The Bernal Heights Community Center for the Arts

This project draws upon the artistically vibrant neighborhood of Bernal Heights in San Francisco, culminating in an arts center that shows off local musicians and visual artists, encourages creativity for kids in nearby schools through arts education, and celebrates the site as a gateway into the larger San Francisco Area. Three primary volumes that house major public programs centered around visual, musical, and theatrical arts position themselves on the site facing the city. The volumes are connected to blend the arts programs, and a series of cuts carves through the main building at the ground level to connect pedestrian pathways from the nearby schools, commercial district, and Muni line to the larger city of San Francisco.

Each of these public programs - a lecture hall for the arts, a dance studio for theater, and an outdoor amphitheater for music - has a view of the city, and is a place where both community residents and visitors to San Francisco can gather to immerse themselves in the arts, while gallery spaces on the southern facade draw people into the building. The volumes themselves are pulled towards the north and southern ends of the site to connect the entrance into the city to the city itself. Another moment of connection between the volumes comes in the form of its facade of aluminum fins, which wraps and folds continuously around the volumes and into the roofline in a “dancing” rhythm.