SHERMAN HEIGHTS COMMUNITY CENTER

San Diego, California

With the demise of both the church and town square as social catalysts in America, the neighborhood community center has become an important civic building type, providing communities with a focus and heart. Sherman Heights is an older, but vibrant, multicultural residential neighborhood close to San Diego’s core. Other than this center, its only amenity is an elementary school across the street. The Sherman Heights Community Center was created through a series of bi-lingual community workshops in which participants actively determined the building program, architectural image, and urban character of the center and an adjacent park. As a result of this process, the community confidently gave the architect artistic control that is generally unafforded by the normally conservative and bureaucratic relationship between architect and city.