A new environmental study released by UCLA offers a closer look at plans to repurpose the shuttered Westside Pavilion shopping mall as a research hub.

Exterior view looking northFlad Architects

UCLA Research Park, which will include two wings at 10800 and 10850 W. Pico Boulevard, will approximately 800,000 square feet of space through a combination of adaptive reuse and new construction. Those uses include:

  • 271,000 square feet of wet and dry laboratories;
  • 214,000 square feet of offices;
  • 52,400 square feet of meeting areas,
  • 258,700 square feet of common areas, circulation areas, and back of house functions; and
  • 14,700 square feet of food service areas.

Plans also call for more than 29,000 square feet of open space and outdoor amenities across the more than nine-acre site, and room for 1,100 parking spaces.

Aerial view looking southeastFlad Architects

Anchor tenants announced for the building include the California Institute for Immunology and Immunotherapy, which is funded in part by a $120-million donation from Dr. Gary Michelson and his wife Alya Michelson, and will occupy roughly half of the research floor area. UCLA's Quantum Innovation Hub - part of the "SoCal Quantum Alliance" with USC, Cal State San Marcos, Caltech, JPL, UC Irvine, UC San Diego, Pasadena City College, HRL Laboratories, Boeing, Monarch Quantum, Cisco, IBM and the Aerospace Corp. UCLA - will initially occupy 40,000 square feet of space, and potentially up to triple that amount. The UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine will also have a presence at the facility, as well as potential additional UCLA tenants and non-UCLA tenants.

While the bulk of work at the project involves upgrading or modifying exiting buildings, limited new construction would include a new lobby pavilion, a conference center, an expanded loading facility, an expansion of the existing pedestrian bridge, a redesign of the main entry plaza, and other modifications to circulation and service areas in across the property.

Flad Architects is designing UCLA Research Park, with OBJ serving as landscape architect.

Aerial view looking northFlad Architects

Construction and occupancy of Research Park is occurring in phases over the coming years, with project components reaching completion between late 2027 and 2035.

UCLA, which has also acquire the historic Trust Building in Downtown Los Angeles and the former Marymount California University campus in Rancho Palos Verdes, has invested heavily to establish satellite facilities across L.A. County in recent years. The school acquired the former Westside Pavilion from Hudson Pacific Properties, which had previously intended to convert the shuttered mall into an office campus for Google.

Research Park is but one component of the former Westside Pavilion. Other sections of the mall located to the east have been redeveloped in recent years with a mixture of housing and commercial uses.

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