18th Street Arts Center

Santa Monica, CA, 2023

The 18th Street Arts Center is a nonprofit arts center in Santa Monica, California and is the longest running artist residency center in Southern California. 18th Street Arts Center’s residency program hosts 60 or more American and international artists and curators a year.

In a competitive process, Steven Chavez was selected to produce a master plan for the campus.

The process began with presenting three master plan alternatives. The first concept’s primary feature included a woonerf living street, the second concept’s primary feature included a campus axis connecting all five buildings of the campus, and the third concept’s main feature included a campus kitchen garden.

All three concepts were influenced by an in-depth site analysis coupled with the colors, materials, forms and textures of Juan O’Gorman’s Museo Casa Estudio Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo.

The master plan design review process by the 18th Street Arts Center community resulted in a final master plan that combines elements from all three master plan alternatives.

Construction on phase 1, the eastern portion of the campus, begins in the summer of 2023.