Daniel Webster Elementary Modernization

San Francisco USD

 

In collaboration as Joint Venture Architect with Noll & Tam Architects, S Meek Architecture provided designs for the modernization and elevator addition to Daniel Webster Elementary. To connect multiple buildings at multiple levels, the elevator tower was combined with a lobby on the ground floor and an expanded library at the second floor.

 

The school's existing classroom building had a modular 1970’s educational layout - where every classroom was entered from exterior stairs and the only classrooms with access to the restrooms are the central classrooms. A new dedicated internal hallway will improve wayfinding and orientation as well as safety. Expanding the available space for the warming kitchen at the back of the Aauditorium will enable the equipment to fit within the kitchen, rather than scattered at the edges of the public space, and thus return some dignity to the school’s major public gathering space.

Harvey Milk Memorial Plaza

San Francisco Public Prize International Design Competition Honorable Mention

 

The rainbow flag, a symbol of slain San Francisco supervisor Harvey Milk’s crusade for gay rights, was important to the program authors; Stoner Meek’s design proposal blankets the intersection with a grand flag of flowers that could be seen from an airplane flying over San Francisco on Harvey Milk’s birthday.  A memorial also reminds us of the ebb and flow of living things, which we addressed in the very “planting” of the pavement as part of a five-day celebration each year. Afterwards, the flats would be given away to be planted in gardens all over the city in return for a donation toward next year’s installation, so the cycle could begin anew.

 

 

Pell Mall - Vallejo Plaza Mall, Vallejo, California

Finalist in Dead Malls Competition sponsored by LA Forum, 2003

 

SMA's proposal adopts the 19th century European model of the Pell Mell sporting green as inspiration for an ecological transformation of Vallejo Plaza's Dead Mall. The project includes the flooding of parking lots and demolition of two structures to create a marshland. Three new mall types are proposed to financially support the Pell Mall - the Car Mall, the Wind Malll, and the Mud Mall. Electric car dealerships lease island space in the marsh. The Car Mall can be seen from the observation deck on the roof of one of the stores along Sonoma Boulevard. The Wind Mall features family games and sprinklers with power generating windmills that generate power for the project as well as the city. At the northern end of the Pell Meadow, birds and people mingle at the edge of White Slough at the Muddy Mall.  On the projection screen, an image of the plan of Old Vallejo.

 

 

East River Escapes

Distinguished Entry Finalists, 1998 Prize in Public Architecture, New York, NY

 

Sponsored by the non-profit Van Alen Institute in New York, this international design competition for New York’s “other” river was inspired by the fact that many consider the East River to be less attractive, less interesting, and less of a development opportunity than the Hudson River.  This proposal links the existing transportation network of subway stations along the river to a series of “natural events,” both existing and proposed, above ground.  Intended as sites for a short vacation from the powerful pace of the commercial city, each of these seventeen “escapes” reveals a particular mood, idiosyncrasy, or recreational possibility where river and city meet.