Architecture firm HKS and landscape designer Hood Design Studio have been selected by global entertainment and media company CMNTY Culture to design a new creative campus in the heart of Hollywood. Dubbed CMNTY Culture Campus, the project will feature production spaces, offices, performance venues, bringing together creative industries in a 500,000-square-foot development.
The project comes as a response to the changes taking place in the entertainment industry, where there's new opportunities to reimagine the landscape where content is created and consumed. As explained by Philip Lawrence, owner of recording studio the Record Plant, "creatives and their audiences now seek opportunities to collaborate and interact, not just in the digital sphere, but in-person. Content creators need a physical epicenter, a place that celebrates their work and the power of community". With that, CMNTY Culture Campus is set to be a place where creative people get to socialize with like-minded individuals and share their experiences.
Located on a 2-acre site at the corner of Sunset Boulevard and Highland Avenue, the proposed campus will be one of the largest Black-owned enterprises in the area, bringing together artists, content creators, tech and media companies, agencies and management companies, and other entertainment sectors who have been supporting artistic creation and enriching the Hollywood community. 430,000 square feet of creative office spaces will be allocated alongside studio/production space, pre- and post-production facilities, education space, and performance venues. The development will also feature a 500-seat auditorium occupying the street-level corner of the building at Highland and Sunset along with a rooftop terrace.
Music has always steered and reflected culture. Our goal here is to bring people of diverse backgrounds together and amplify voices into something greater than the individual. We want to create a place that is transparent and permeable. The musical instrument is not just the inspiration for the building, but it’s a metaphor for much of the design of CMNTY Culture Campus, creating a performative quality for the building dramatizing that there is something exciting happening here. -- Heath May, Principal at HKS
Launched in 2020, CMNTY Culture is a Black-owned, independent music and media enterprise founded by GRAMMY award-winning songwriter Philip Lawrence in partnership with Thomas St. John, founder of Thomas St. John Group, an international accounting and business management firm. The company is dedicated to advocating for and empowering artists across disciplines, as well as promoting and advancing racial equity, social justice and diversity/inclusion in all aspects of its business.
