Elliot Building
An 80-year-old historical concrete structure, the Elliot Building formerly housed a car dealership. The rehabilitated building now houses 18 premier lofts and creative office space, as well as two ground floor restaurants, P.F. Chang's and Mikuni. Challenges included inadequate concrete reinforcement, as the building had settled and was damaged. The change of occupancy also required meeting current building code, while adding an additional fourth floor to the existing structure. Through Performance Based Engineering, friction dampers were designed to dissipate the dynamic energy of an earthquake and fiber reinforced plastic increased floor capacity.
Griffith Observatory
The renovation of the Griffith Observatory, one of the architectural icons of Los Angeles, was a major feat of structural engineering. Historic preservation requirements made it necessary to construct all new spaces underground. New subterranean exhibit and support spaces totaling 25,000 square feet were added to the existing building by extending and deepening the existing partial basement. To do so required underpinning existing walls and columns, excavating new spaces under the main floor, and constructing new columns and foundations at the required depth. Other modifications included adding new stairs and elevators within the existing building, adding a new hillside mechanical plant, and modifying the existing Planetarium floor.
Hotel Stockton
The Hotel Stockton, built in 1910, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, yet it lay vacant for 20 years due to cost-prohibitive and function-prohibitive rehabilitation designs by other engineers. Miyamoto's Performance Based Design made the mixed-use conversion project viable. Miyamoto performed non-linear dynamic analyses and designed seismic shock dampers and fiber reinforced polymer composites at the first story level to reduce seismic demand. A very economical rehabilitation cost of $9 per square foot was achieved.
Chen Building
Cathedral Building
511 F Street
