Walt Disney Concert Hall
Gehry Partners, LLP

Photo courtesy FOGA

Located on a historically and culturally prominent downtown site, the Walt Disney Concert Hall is the permanent home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The Concert Hall is situated on historic Bunker Hill at the intersection of First Street and Grand Avenue, adjacent to the existing Music Center of Los Angeles.

The project began as an invited design competition, during which many of the fundamental design tenets were established. These include an open and accessible main entrance, a sympathetic and inclusive attitude in the building's relationship to the Music Center's existing Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, a pedestrian scale frontage along Grand Avenue, a generous and open backstage area, and a large garden.

It is a serene, ennobling building that will give people in this city of private places a new sense of the pleasures of public space.

/Paul Goldberger

Photo courtesy FOGA

Photo courtesy FOGA

Photo courtesy FOGA

Photo courtesy FOGA

Photo courtesy FOGA

Photo courtesy FOGA
Many design elements have evolved since the competition, most notably the Hall's shape, the foyer size, and the consideration and subsequent elimination of a chamber hall and a 350-room hotel.

From Design start in 1987, to Construction start in 1999, to the Inauguration in 2003... it took sixteen years!

Photo: arcspace
Los Angeles 2002

Photo: arcspace
Los Angeles 2001

Photo: arcspace

Photo: arcspace

Photo: Whit Preston

Photo: Whit Preston

Photo: Whit Preston
Concert Hall Studies

Photo: arcspace
Los Angeles 2002

Sketch courtesy Frank Gehry
Sketch courtesy Frank Gehry