Eastside College Preparatory School, Performing Arts Center
Palo Alto, Calif.
Fernau & Hartman Architects

Fernau & hartman "supersizes" a small project, creating a building that has become the heart of its community

© Sharon Risedorph

For more photos click on 'photos & drawings' above. To see the people and products behind this project click on 'people & products.'

By Lisa Findley

Among Silicon Valley’s dirty little secrets are the low-income neighborhoods struggling to survive in the sea of high-tech wealth. One of these is East Palo Alto, a town of 32,000 nestled across a freeway from the affluent home of Stanford University, Palo Alto. One sixth of the community lives below the poverty line, and the last of its public high schools closed in the 1970s, forcing students into long bus commutes to schools in surrounding areas.

Chris Bischof, who grew up nearby and played basketball in East Palo Alto during high school, and a friend set out to change the fact that only 35 percent of East Palo Alto students finish high school. They launched a modest after-school program called “Shoot for the Stars,” which rewarded intensive study with basketball. By 1996, the popular program had become a full high school: Eastside College Preparatory School, with Bischof as its principal.

The school selected Fernau & Hartman to design the Eastside Center for the Arts, which quickly became the heartbeat of the campus, as well as a draw for the entire community. Principals Richard Fernau and Laura Hartman designed a proper proscenium stage with a fly, a sound booth, a lighting grid, and greenrooms. A darkroom was added for photography, and the scene shop, with a roll-up loading door, is also used for painting, drawing, and sculpture. An enlarged dance studio doubles as a rehearsal space and a tiny theater. In the theater, upholstered seating for 190 people forms an intimate arc around a semithrust stage that makes a flexible performance space. The building’s architectural trade-offs are important to note. In the mild Bay Area climate, the lobby space is kept small but can be augmented by outdoor space covered by the overhang of the dance studio above. While a serious working theater wrapped with other art activities, the building has playful massing, carefully scaled fenestration, lively colors, and a porosity of circulation that invites casual interaction and daily use. Bischof, who was initially wary of adding an arts focus, notes, “Now that this building is here and I see how proud the students are of it and how they use it, I cannot imagine Eastside without it.”

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Formal name of Project:
Eastside College Preparatory School, Performing Arts Center

Location:
Palo Alto, Calif.

Gross square footage:
9,100 sq. ft.

Total construction cost:
$3.4 million

Owner:
Eastside College Preparatory School

Architect:
Fernau & Hartman Architects, Inc.
2512 Ninth Street No. 2
Berkeley California 94710
Ph: 510.848.4480
Fax: 510.848.4532
www.fernauhartman.com