Downtown, Los Angeles, CA

This evening I had the pleasure of touring Coop Himmelb(l)au’s Los Angeles flagship (well, that’s kind of pushing connotation, though parts of it do look like a FLAG on a SHIP). I present you with Central Los Angeles High School No. 9, the city’s newest arts high school, opened last fall in downtown.

I don’t know how to emphasize just how state-of-the-art this state-of-the-art school is, other than to say, if CalArts looked like this… well. I wish CalArts looked like this. (Not to be a killjoy, but it remains to be seen whether the facilities will still be so cutting-edge by the time they manage to find and fund the additional teachers needed in order to fully take advantage of them…)

I hope that this place, as fraught as its development and opening were — and existence continues to be, both politically and fiscally — will manage to be safe, inspiring, and catalyzing for kids of all backgrounds from this city.

P.S. From the street you would never guess that they fit an athletic field in the center of this campus. Amazing.