ASLA design contest reimagines DTLA's shuttered Angels Knoll

Among the numerous never-built mega-projects of the bygone DTLA real estate boom is Angels Landing, a joint venture from the Peebles Corporation and MacFarlane Partners which would have seen the construction of residential, hotel, and commercial uses and one of the neighborhood's tallest towers.

The project site, one of the last undeveloped plots of land on Bunker Hill, sits at the northwest corner of 4th and Hill Streets, near Angels Flight and Grand Central Market. Before plans for Angels Landing fell through, the site was intended for the never-built third tower of the California Plaza complex. In the years that followed, with tepid demand for high-rise office space, the powers that be turned the property into a temporary park known as Angels Knoll, which was famous in the film 500 Days of Summer, and then unceremoniously closed off to the public in 2013 in the midst of state budget cuts.

After sitting empty for 13 years, the American Society of Landscape Architecture asked how this seemingly forgotten park could return to use as open space. ASLA posed that question to competitors in its second annual Emerging Professional’s Design Competition, the results of which follow: 

First Place: Folding Angel's Knoll
By Yuehui Gong, Associate ASLA

The jury awarded first place to Folding Angel's Knoll for its exceptional cohesiveness of graphics, remarkable depth of thought, and compelling multi-media storytelling. Jurors were particularly struck by the richness of the phasing narrative from Year 0 to 20+, the grounding in geological processes, and the attention to the "everyday" as a place for people to come together. The submission was described as impeccable, with a graphic quality that beautifully illustrates how the site responds, evolves, and adapts over time.

Second Place (Tied): Action! Thermal Justice in Motion 
By Zitong Huang, Associate ASLA; Yiding Han, Associate ASLA; and Yuan Tian, ASLA

Action, Thermal Justice in Motion stood out for its creativity, clarity, and deep responsiveness to the site's history and future. The jury was particularly impressed by the team's framing of wealth as a thermal barrier and their clear concept diagrams around opening and reclaiming the site, connecting and planting, cooling and programming, and adapting for future-proofing, all in service of their vision of the site as "a climate refuge, a civic living room, and an ecological anchor." Jurors also praised the inclusive pathways and ramps and the strong connectivity to the surrounding community.

Second Place (Tied): SOIL HOLDS: MATTER, MEMORY, COMMONS 
By Jiewen Hu, Associate ASLA; Zicheng Zhao, Associate ASLA; and Zhijie Wang, Associate ASLA

SOIL HOLDS: MATTER, MEMORY, COMMONS stood out for its rigorously researched, community-engaged approach and striking graphic richness. The jury was particularly impressed by the process centered on the soil itself - uncovering, holding, feeding, growing, and establishing a new ecology from the ground up. Jurors called it one of the strongest and most graphically rich submissions in the competition, praising how the material cues and qualities reflected the soil while surfacing the site's erased histories, geologies, and memories.

Honorable Mentions

Unlocking the Knoll — by Shuai Yuan, Associate ASLA; Pie Chueathue, Associate ASLA; and Zenith Zhang, Student ASLA

Reweaving the Hill — by Peixuan Wu, ASLA; Ellena Wong, Associate ASLA; and Liwei Shen, ASLA

Twitter / Facebook / LinkedIn / Threads / Instagram / Bluesky