The grand umbrella illuminated

A veritable fruit and vegetable museum!

First sketches

The old Safeway. We wrapped the old building with the new and doubled the footprint.

Study model.

Drawings for the 36' diameter free standing umbrella structure.

Stacking blocks.

Artist Ross Drago's ceramic decorations on the Shattuck Ave facade.

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Berkeley Bowl Marketplace

Berkeley, California 1997

The Berkeley Bowl, a family-owned marketplace known regionally for its outstanding produce, relocated to a long-vacant Safeway Supermarket site. This project approximately doubled the size of the existing grocery store to 44,000 square feet, adding retail floor area, a 90 seat cafe, new second-floor administrative offices, and back-of-the-house service space. The scope of work included demolishing all but one exterior wall and expanding the building in three directions, creating a more urbane street condition along Shattuck Avenue. Sandblasted concrete block, cast stone, steel, and glass provide a simple, economical and durable palette of exterior materials.

The entrance of the new building is designed as a courtyard-like space, so as to encourage the kind of lively street life and community gathering which is a natural complement to the Berkeley Bowl. This project, backed by a coalition of neighborhood and community groups, marked a new era of revitalization for South Berkeley.

Cutsheet for Berkeley Bowl Marketplace

Trachtenberg Architects: David Trachtenberg, A. Eugene Sparling, Patricia Solis-Fillon, Christian Dauer, Jason Dries-Daffner
Owner: Glenn and Dianne Yasuda
Structural Engineer: Ingraham DeJesse Associates
HVAC: Hussmann
Civil Engineer: Van Maren Associates
Ceramic Artist: Ross Drago
Store Development: Certified Grocers (John Vierra)
Landscape Architect: Miller Company
Builder: E.F. Anderson, Inc.
Photography: Muffy Kibbey

Budget: $4.5M