WeHo plans three discussions on playhouse design

Wave Staff Report

WEST HOLLYWOOD — The city is inviting the community to attend upcoming discussions for the new West Hollywood City Playhouse that will replace the former Coast Playhouse, located at 8325 Santa Monica Blvd., across the street from City Hall at Sweetzer Avenue. 

Proposed as a new 99-seat approximately 5,000-square-foot venue, the playhouse will serve as an arts and cultural event facility that will support artists and nonprofit arts organizations by providing an accessible venue in the city. The project will include public programming and an outdoor landscaped civic space.

The City Council Playhouse Design Steering Committee will conduct three discussions over the next three months to collect feedback and ideas and finalize the design for the new playhouse.

The first meeting will take place at 5 p.m. March 14 in the Kings Road Park Community Room, 1000 N. Kings Road. The purpose of the meeting will be to review community feedback to date, review the project’s goals and objectives, discuss site and building programming opportunities and discuss initial design concepts.

The second meeting will be held at 5 p.m. April 18 in the Kings Road Park Community Room, to review updated design concepts and technical refinements based on previous input from the community and steering committee.

The third meeting will be held at 5 p.m. May 23, again in the Kings Road Park Community Room. That meeting will review updated design concepts and technical refinements based on previous input from the community and to determine recommendations to the City Council regarding the programming and design of the playhouse.

In February, the city hosted two community design visioning workshops with local artists and performers, as well as other community members. City staff is putting together input from these previous community workshops and the design team will receive guidance from the steering committee and community members during the next three sessions to finalize design plans for the playhouse.

The steering committee includes members of the City Council; members of several civic commissions as well as technical advisors and experts in fields including performance facility design, theatre technology, climate and sustainability, open space goals and construction. 

For more information, contact Michael Barker, project architect, at 323-848-6483.