15000 Aviation Boulevard Seismic Evaluation & Retrofit  

Hawthorne, CA | 206,945 sq ft / 6 stories

Built in 1972, 15000 Aviation Boulevard is a 6-story office building located in the city of Hawthorne. Designed by Cesar Pelli in 1966, it was the first-designed Southern California building to have a mirrored skin. The mirrored glass skin would become widespread in the corporate architectural designs of the 1970s and 1980s, but it fittingly saw its start here as the West Coast Headquarters of the Federal Aviation Administration. This also marks the Los Angeles Conservancy’s first postwar historic building.

Our structural scope included the seismic evaluation and retrofit of the existing building using the latest seismic design and retrofit criteria. After careful evaluation of the seismic deficiencies for the existing building, a cost-effective retrofit program was proposed which included strengthening of the existing lateral elements and introduction of new lateral elements at strategic locations to provide adequate stiffness and strength, as well as to provide a continuous load path for seismic forces to the existing foundation with minimal impact on the building configuration and occupancy.