The $75 million expansion of the Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Koreatown will soon be underway.
The 55,000-square-foot Audrey Irmas Pavilion is being designed by the Office of Metropolitan Architecture, led by Rem Koolhaas and Shohei Shigematsu. The groundbreaking ceremony for the futuristic building will take place Nov. 11, according to Urbanize.
The three-story trapezoidal building will house a banquet hall, commercial kitchen and meeting rooms. It presents a striking contrast to the neighboring Byzantine Revival temple at 3663 Wilshire Boulevard, which was built in 1929.
The new construction’s façade includes hundreds of small windows, and the building appears to lean away from the temple. The synagogue revealed the designs earlier this year.
There will also be a rooftop garden. It will replace a parking lot at the synagogue campus, which also has educational buildings and a social services center.
The new building is named after art collector and philanthropist Audrey Irmas, who donated $30 million toward the $75 million construction cost. As of April, the synagogue had raised $55 million for the project. Construction is expected to wrap up sometime in 2020. [Urbanize] — Dennis Lynch